“White Coal” for Petrograd: Attempts at Energy Transition During First World War
https://doi.org/10.24224/2227-1295-2023-12-10-230-247
Abstract
This article examines the origins of Russian hydropower in the prerevolutionary period. From the 1880s, entrepreneurs in the Russian Empire began constructing small hydroelectric power stations for industrial purposes. Despite a lack of statelevel attention for these technologies for an extended period, they were studied by the Imperial Russian Technical Society. The First World War sparked interest in hydropower among government authorities as fuel and financial crises forced the government to seek cheaper energy sources. Legislative measures for regulating the use of water bodies and the practical application of hydropower, which were carried out by the government between 1915 and 1917, received further implementation in Bolshevik Russia. The author analyzes the process of transitioning from discussions about the potential uses of hydropower to the practical implementation of the first hydroelectric projects, emphasizing the key role of the war in accelerating this transition. The source base of the study consisted of administrative documents from the Council of Ministers, the Ministry of Transportation, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, official statistics, press materials, and scholarly literature.
Keywords
history of hydropower,
Maly Imatra,
Russian Empire,
environmental history,
economic policy,
energy sector,
energy transition
Supporting agencies: The study is supported by Russian Science Foundation (RSF), project number 22-28-01558, https://rscf.ru/project/22-28-01558/
About the Author
A. B. Agafonova
National Research University Higher School of Economics
Russian Federation
Russian Federation
Anna B. Agafonova - PhD in History, Researcher, Laboratory of Environmental and Technological History.
St. Petersburg
References
1. Belyakov, A. A. (2010). On the legal foundations of hydropower. Real estate and investments. Legal regulation, 4: 103—109. (In Russ.).
2. Burdin, E. A. (2010). Historical aspects and dynamics of the development of Russian hydro-power in the 1900s—1980s (on the example of the Volga cascade o hydroelectric power plants). Proceedings of the Samara Scientific Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 12 (2): 107—113. (In Russ.).
3. Burdin, E. A. (2010). Hydraulic engineering in Russia: from the Samara Volgostroy to the Big Volga (1930—1980). Ulyanovsk: UlSPU. 222 p. ISBN 978-5-86045-392-0. (In Russ.).
4. Coopersmith, J. (1992). The Electrification of Russia, 1880—1926. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. 274 p. ISBN 0-8014-2723-1.
5. Flaxerman, Yu. N. (1970). GOELRO plan in action. Moscow: Energia. 65 p. (In Russ.).
6. Myllyntaus, T. (1997). Electrical Imperialism or Multinational Cooperation? The Role of Big Business in Supplying Light and Power to St. Petersburg before 1917. Business and Economic History, 26 (2): 546—548.
7. Neporozhny, P. S. (ed.) (1967). Electrification of the USSR. 1917—1967. Moscow: Energia. 543 p. (In Russ.).
8. Pravilova, E. (2022). Empire in search of the common good. Property in prerevolutionary Russia. Moscow: New Literary Review. 560 p. ISBN: 978-5-4448-1870-1. (In Russ.).
9. Radkau, Y. (2014). Nature and Power: a world History of the Environment. Moscow: Pub-lishing House of the Higher School of Economics. 472 p. ISBN 978-5-7598-1109-1. (In Russ.).
10. Simonov, N. S. (2016). Development of hydropower in the Russian Empire. The prehistory of GOELRO. Moscow: Russian Foundation for the Promotion of Education and Science. 320 p. ISBN 978-5-91244-175-2. (In Russ.).
11. Tamir, D. (2018). Something New under the Fog of War: The First World War and the Debut of Oil on the Global Stage. In: Environmental Histories of the First World War. Cam-bridge University Press. 117—135. DOI:10.1017/9781108554237.006.
12. Tucker, R. P., Keller, T., McNeill, J. R., Schmid, M. (2018). Environmental Histories of the First World War. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 312 p. ISBN 9781108554237.
13. Zhimerin, D. G. (1960). Development of the USSR energy industry. Moscow, Leningrad: State Energy Publishing House. 327 p. (In Russ.).
14. Zhimerin, D. G. (1962). The history of electrification of the USSR. Moscow: Publishing House of socio-economic literature. 458 p. (In Russ.).
Review
For citations:
Agafonova A.B. “White Coal” for Petrograd: Attempts at Energy Transition During First World War. Nauchnyi dialog. 2023;12(10):230-247. (In Russ.) https://doi.org/10.24224/2227-1295-2023-12-10-230-247
Views:
284
Email this article 