In the twentieth century, few inventions had as enduring an influence on the economy and environment, as well as on the daily lives of millions of people, as the internal combustion engines developed by Nikolaus Otto (1832-1891) in the 1860s and Rudolf Diesel (1858-1913) in the 1890s. While Otto’s engines required spark plugs for fuel combustion, Diesel’s engine achieved this with high compression. These inventions could power automobiles, locomotives, ships, and airplanes, and paved the way for mass mobility and the steadily rising exchange of people and goods worldwide. At the same time, this has caused massive changes to the landscape and the environment through the building of countless roads, global air pollution, and the increasing resource and energy consumption of high-energy societies.
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Further Readings:
- McNeill, John R. Something New Under the Sun: An Environmental History of the Twentieth Century World. New York: Norton, 2000.
- Mom, Gijs, Gordon Pirie, and Laurent Tissot, eds. Mobility in History: The State of the Art in the History of Transport, Traffic and Mobility. Neuchâtel: Editions Alphil, 2009.
- Uekötter, Frank. Umweltgeschichte im 19. und 20 Jahrhundert. Munich: Oldenbourg, 2007.
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1862
