About eight percent of Earth’s freshwater is located in Greenland. Theoretically, this would mean that Greenland has some of the greatest potential for hydropower in the whole world. However, nearly all its freshwater is permanently frozen.

In the Middle Ages, the main energy sources were firewood, charcoal, animals, and human muscle power. By 1860, 93 percent of the energy expended in England and Wales came from coal. Why did the transition occur when it did and why was it so slow?

This article considers the various factors that hindered intensification of industrial activity and retarded national economic growth. Eventually the pressure of social and cultural factors encouraged abandonment of the use of an abundant and relatively cheap resource—peat—and promoted the use of a scarcer and more expensive alternative—coal.