Electrifying Europe: The Power of Europe in the Construction of Electricity Networks

ISBN-13: 9789052603094 / Angielski / Miękka / 2009 / 246 str.

Vincent Lagendijk

Opis

Combining a wide array of rarely used sources, this book unravels how engineers, industrialists, and policymakers gained support for building an interconnected European system, achieved by 1995. The empirical chapters show how ideas of European cooperation in general became intertwined with network planning during the Interwar period, although the Depression and WWII prevented an European network from being constructed. The subsequent chapters describe the influence of the Marshall Plan on European network-building, focusing on both its economic and military aspects. The last chapter portrays how the Iron Curtain was contested. This book is a valuable addition to existing national histories of electrification. It is an original contribution to the history of technology, while also making the role of technology visible in more mainstream European history.