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Oil wells are drilled in China up to 800 feet deep using bits attached to bamboo poles.
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By 1800 Alessandro Volta had developed the so-called voltaic pile, a forerunner of the electric battery, which produced a steady stream of electricity.
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The first lighters were invented in the 16th century and were converted flintlock pistols that used gunpowder.
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Drilling for geothermal water at Larderello, Italy intensifies due to new methods
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Jump to Electric light: Edison made the first public demonstration of his incandescent light bulb on December 31, 1879, in Menlo Park.
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The first places that sold gasoline/petrol were pharmacies, as a side business. The first gas/petrol station was the city pharmacy in Wiesloch, Germany, where Bertha Benz refilled the tank of the first automobile on its maiden trip from Mannheim to Pforzheim and back.
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The first running, gasoline-powered American car was built and road-tested by the Duryea brothers of Springfield, Massachusetts.
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The first nuclear reactor begins operation in Richland, Washington
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The USSR's Obninsk Nuclear Power Plant became the world's first nuclear power plant to generate electricity for a power grid, and produced around 5 megawatts of electric power
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On this day in 1955, William G. Cobb of the General Motors Corp. (GM) demonstrates his 15-inch-long "Sunmobile," the world's first solar-powered automobile, at the General Motors Powerama auto show held in Chicago, Illinois.
