J-B. Fressoz has published an original book on the history of energy and a reflection on economic thought. He engages in a polemic against “Nobelized” economists such as Jevons, Veblen, Nordhaus and Romer. Their theses have concealed the gravity and urgency of the climate challenge. In particular, he argues that the notion of “creative destruction”, put forward by Schumpeter, is responsible for the relative inaction of governments in the face of the climate crisis. Fressoz revisits the history of energy, which covers a succession of energy systems, separated by transitions “from the organic economy to the mineral economy,” “from coal to oil,” or “from fossil fuels to renewable energies.” These transitions are marked, according to the author, by perception biases that he describes as “transitionist.”
The author analyzes “the symbiotic entanglement and expansion of all energies” since the beginning of the19th century, stating that “the history of energy is not that of an accumulation”, but that of the “intellectual construction of the energy transition” – both “technological project” and “industrial slogan” – which, since the 1970s, has been imposed as “the future of experts, governments and companies”.
Fressoz’s account innovates both conceptually and formally. In particular, he introduces the notion of a “symbiotic entity”: he considers, for example, that wood, coal, and oil are more “symbiotic entities” than mere sources of primary energy competing with each other. The economist must integrate all the material processes related to the production of these three energies, and demonstrate that each of them “has drawn consumption from the other two, including for energy uses” .
Fressoz’s “new history of energy” covers two centuries of industrialization of the world, marked not by “transitions”, additions, or energy destruction, but by “new symbioses between fossil and alternative energy sources. »
The entire book remains homogeneous, although some excerpts are revised versions of articles or chapters of previously published works.
Jean Baptiste Fressoz is a historian of science, technology and the environment. After having been a lecturer at Imperial College London, he is now a researcher at CNRS and a teacher at the École des Ponts et Chausssées.
Review written by Jean-Jacques PLUCHART