The Londoner enjoying a cup of tea with sugar in 1854 was drawing upon a vast global energy network with each sip: the human labor of the sugarcane plantations in the West Indies and the newly formed tea plantations in India; the solar energy in those tropical realms that allowed those plants to flourish; the oceanic energy of the trade currents, and the steam power of the railway engine; the fossil fuels powering the looms in Lancashire, making fabrics that helped fund the entire trade system.
