An Electric Revolution
Podcast Description
Clean energy is under attack like never before.
President Donald Trump has said “the wind is bullshit.” Right-wing parties in Europe have opposed climate legislation introduced by the European Union.
There has never been a more important time to understand the real history of clean energy—how did we get here, who were the pioneers, and why has it taken so long to come of age?
An Electric Revolution dives deep into the untold story of clean energy, from its groundbreaking origins to its present-day battles.
Podcast Insights
Content Themes
The podcast covers significant themes in clean energy, including the historical context of its development, the pioneers who shaped the industry, and contemporary challenges faced today. Notable episodes include deep dives into figures like Poul la Cour, who launched Denmark's wind power dominance, and Charles Brush, America's wind power pioneer, focusing on their innovations and contributions to the sector.
Clean energy is under attack like never before.
President Donald Trump has said “the wind is bullshit.” Right-wing parties in Europe have opposed climate legislation introduced by the European Union.
There has never been a more important time to understand the real history of clean energy—how did we get here, who were the pioneers, and why has it taken so long to come of age?
An Electric Revolution dives deep into the untold story of clean energy, from its groundbreaking origins to its present-day battles.
This week we are talking about the life of George Cove, a Canadian inventor and entrepreneur.
Born in Nova Scotia in 1863 or 1864, Cove presented his first “solar electric generator” in 1905 in the Metropole Building in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
He then moved to the US to continue work on his solar device. In 1909 he exhibited four solar panels on a New York rooftop, which were used to charge lead-acid batteries.
This was decades before the first conventional photovoltaic solar panel as we know it today was invented at Bell Labs.
Cove intended to use the heat of the sun to generate electricity, a so-called thermoelectric generator. But he may have accidentally created a solar panel that generated electricity via the photovoltaic effect – similar to current panels we have today.
In October of the same year Cove was kidnapped. Some reports say his life was threatened if he did not cease work on solar power. Afterwards his company, Sun Electric Generator Company, collapsed.
I’m delighted to be joined by Dr. Sugandha Srivastav. She is a Lecturer in Environmental Economics and a Senior Research Associate at the University of Oxford.
In 2023 she published a fascinating paper on George Cove which argued that solar powercould have become cheaper than coal at least a decade earlier than it did, if Cove’s business had succeeded.
She argues that in the early 1900s people were remarkably positive about solar power and its potential, yet that attitude then disappeared for decades.
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