In an alternate history work of fiction, what would be a good way to rationalize/justify a world in which there is no usage of fossil fuels?
I think in this alternate history / worldbuilding idea, the physical matter still exists - there is coal, oil, etc, in the earth, but I am wondering if we can come up with a satisfying reason why humans could not make use of anything more efficient than peat in production. Is there a scientific-sounding explanation that could be given to make a world in which coal and oil are useless in industry?
I have been reading “The Future is Degrowth” and “The Origin of Capitalism” and that is what inspired this. The first book says something along the lines of “the capitalism we know, of endless accumulation, is fundamentally a fossil capitalism”. The second book makes a very convincing case that what existed in England centuries before fossil fuels was already distinctly (agrarian) capitalist. Interest in everyone’s thoughts and ideas about how this could be constructed, and what sort of events could play it out in the cradle of capitalism but also worldwide.
I mentioned it on the other reply and I’m by no means an expert in the area. But besides just good ol’ charcoal, there are many kinds of fuels synthesised from organic matter and specifically alcohol fuels that have basically the same general pros and cons as their fossil counterparts, but in varying degrees. There also other technologies that substitute some of the work of fuels, such as hydroelectric dams and wind turbines that have their own set of pros and cons that are conceivable in a world without fossil fuel given how wind/watermills have existed for way longer than factories or gasoline. Could be a fun world-building idea to have factories setup along coastlines for pre-electricity local wind power.
No technology is perfect, it just turns out that fossil fuels are both really cheap on human labour and also really terrible everything living. But imagine a world where more than half the population is cutting sugarcane to make urbanites somewhere else happy though, and you’ve accidentally imagined tropical Latin America before the abolition.