In his influential 2016 book Fossil Capital: The Rise of Steam Power and the Roots of Global Warming, Swedish scholar Andreas Malm offered a new explanation for the English cotton manufacturing industry’s transition from rural, abundant, and cheap direct-drive waterpower to urban and more expensive stationary coal-generated steam power. After exonerating waterpower’s unreliability, non-scalability and geographical inflexibility, he argued that the real culprits were capitalists who prioritized controlling their workforce in a time of labor unrest, something more easily achieved in large agglomerations with abundant surplus labor. As such, the current climate crisis is rooted in the outcome of a class struggle rather than inherent advantages of carbon fuels over previous power sources. With adequate public planning and support, moving away from carbon fuels towards preferable alternatives should, therefore, be easier than commonly imagined.

This essay challenges Malm’s historical narrative by revisiting traditional and more recent interpretations with evidence that demonstrates how the combination of costlier steam engines and urban locations delivered greater returns on investment because of factors ranging from reduced transportation costs to easier access to larger and more diverse pools, service providers and skilled labor. A case is made that overturning past outcomes of market processes that factored in numerous trade-offs is much more complex, costly and environmentally damaging than suggested by Malm’s historical narrative.