1709 - Technology

Technology

An industrial revolution begins in England with the discovery that coke (coal heated to remove most of its gases) burns with intense heat and may be substituted for charcoal in blast furnaces used to make pig iron. Growth of iron smelting has been limited by the fact that it takes 200 acres of forest to supply one smelting furnace with a year's supply of charcoal, but Worcestershire-born Quaker ironmaster Abraham Darby, 31, finds that coke serves just as well for his furnaces at Coalbrookdale, Shropshire, where he founded the Bristol Iron Company last year and makes iron boilers for the Newcomen engine invented in 1705. His iron enables him to make thin castings that can compete successfully with brass in the manufacture of pots and other hollow ware. Regular use of coke will not come for 50 years and will await improvements by Darby's son and namesake, but Darby's breakthrough brings an immediate surge in the demand for coal and for the Newcomen engine, whose energy will be used increasingly to permit production of coal from flooded colliery galleries.