Most modern heating systems are primarily based on the heating of air. This seems an obvious choice, but there are far worthier alternatives.
Cooling people by increasing local airflow is at least ten times more energy efficient than refrigerating the air in a given space.
A fireless cooker doubles the efficiency of any type of cooking device because it shortens the time on the fire and limits heat transfer losses
Despite technological advancements since the Industrial Revolution, cooking remains a spectacularly inefficient process.
Modular cargo cycles are cheap to build and easy to customize.
Automation is more energy-intensive than mechanisation.
High speed rail is destroying the most valuable alternative to the airplane; the “low speed” rail network that has been in service for decades.
The arrival of compact lithium-ion batteries has increased the performance and diversity of electrically heated clothing.
Lime burning is a now-forgotten industry that sustained many agrarian communities before energy became cheap.
In the nineteenth century, miniature water turbines were connected to the tap and could power any machine that is now driven by electricity
The hydro power installations in use today are less energy efficient than those of earlier centuries.
The trend towards small-scale, decentralised power production means that rope transmission might have a place in our energy system again