Could Victorian technologies save the world?
The Green Shed builds.
To think of 19th century industrial power is to imagine dark smoke spewing from a forest of tall chimneys to choke the air from the pitiful workers below and smear their lives with an oily residue. A coal and oil fuelled environmental nightmare that one might hope to consign to history, but persists today.
And yet, these technologies of iron, brick, wood, brass and steam continue to possess an aesthetic enjoyed by many. Allied with the elegant fashions of the period, the discomforts endured by the Victorians seem to retain a romantic allure. Voluminous skirts of silk, satin, and velvet drape over an hourglass silhouette achieved by tight corsets that cinch the waist. Stiff starched collars chafe the neck under well-fitting tailored suits with waistcoats. Top hats are de rigueur.
Today, the technologies and fashions of the 19th century remain alive in a blend of science fiction, fantasy, and futuristic mechanisms typically called steampunk. Steam from the technologies of the period meets punk to reference a counterculture.
Authors such as Jules Verne and H.G. Wells, known for their imaginative works featuring steam-powered inventions and futuristic Victorian settings, laid the groundwork for what would become steampunk. The term steampunk itself was coined in the 1980s to describe a specific sub-genre of science fiction that envisioned an alternative history where steam-powered machinery persisted and influenced advanced technology.
Beyond fashion, steampunk influences various forms of art, literature, games, and even architecture, imagining a world where steam-powered machinery, retro-futuristic inventions, and elaborate craftsmanship shape an alternate timeline.
Could that well-crafted machinery contribute to our environmental ambitions today? Could this enthusiasm for the technologies of the 19th century form the foundation for a sustainable future?
Innovation is often promoted by constraint, not freedom, and one could be no more constrained than existing in a period when critical technologies were not available at all. There is no centralised electrical power generation and no network of cables to deliver this power to every corner of the globe. Isolated outposts of empire were reliant upon their own resources, and a great many in the world today suffer the very same constraint.
Some imperial aspirations to adventurous self reliance are reflected in the patent record. Here we find sustainable technologies that could draw local power from wind, waves and the sun that employ only nuts, bolts, wood and canvas.
I doubt that these designs could offer the performance that we currently enjoy from the gleaming white fibreglass towers of modern wind turbines, or the enormous power pumped from the concrete heart of a contemporary hydroelectric power station, or the exotic dark glass depths of a modern solar panel.
However, these 19th century technologies are necessarily simple, practical and may be financed, sourced, constructed, maintained and owned by anyone with a basic toolkit. Could we build these technologies ourselves to draw some power back into our own hands? If you can build it, so can others. If others can build it, can it proliferate all by itself?
The simplicity of such technologies are often the source of their aesthetic appeal. Consider, for example, the appeal of an old sailing ship made from wood, canvas, rope and hard labour. This original wind powered sustainable technology is often beautiful. However, are sailing ships beautiful because they are decorated? Or does this appeal arise simply from the exposure of its functions and the interplay between each and the environment? Anyone can look at a sailing ship and explain precisely how it works, and perhaps this imbues the structure with beauty.
Expose the internal workings of Victorian engineering and you will often find an elegant and beautiful mechanism. Consider the Crossness pumping station in London, built in 1865. Essentially a sewage works, but the most beautiful sewage works you’ve ever seen. Is engineering truth inevitably beautiful? Or did those 19th Century engineers, when pencil met paper, deliberately design their mechanisms to appeal to the eye? The decorated sewage works suggests a little of both.
In what alternate future might we now live if this sustainable technology had been deployed, proliferated and developed for nearly two centuries?
The steampunk aesthetic draws inspiration from a fossil powered past that drove elegant and ingenious mechanisms. A large community of enthusiasts embrace a do-it-yourself ethos, in which people are encourage to create their own unique looks by upcycling clothing. Reminders of ingenious and beautiful technologies are incorporated into attire as leather, brass, copper, pistons, gauges and gears. This is not limited to clothing but extends to gadgets, props, and even lifestyles inspired by an alternate reality where steam power and Victorian aesthetics meet advanced technology.
Coal and oil could be replaced with biofuels that cycle carbon in the period of only a few years rather than a millennium. Wood, algae, plant oils, methanol all offer options to raise steam. Some mechanisms to be found in the 19th century patent record are driven by the wind or waves. Some archaic mechanisms can run on the heat of the sun, such as those driven by the Stirling cycle.
With a change of fuel and a little modification to these old devices, might those who retain the Victorian passion for discovery and exploration extend their enthusiasms for 19th century technologies to those that can generate sustainable power with the simplest of tools? Could these technologies contribute to a cleaner, more sustainable and more independent vision of the future?
What was cutting edge technology for Victorians, is probably possible to construct in your shed right now. Personally, I don’t ascribe to this steampunk fashion sense, as I am merely a grubby engineer. However, the Green Shed builds an experiment to determine if this approach is viable, worthwhile and most importantly, fun.
Sometimes, it’s worth looking behind you to see the way ahead.
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I was trying to enjoy a small, sad egg sandwich when I eventually saw him. He was sitting directly opposite me at the plastic dining table that we had both chosen for lunch. Both attending the conference centre, alone, in a crumpled grey suit. He, poking at a sausage roll. Me, with my egg sandwich. He was hard to notice because he was yet another me. En…