How the World Really Works: The Science Behind How We Got Here and Where We're Going

by Vaclav Smil

The need was explained in 1898 in the clearest possible manner by William Crookes, chemist and physicist, to the British Association for the Advancement of Science, in his presidential address dedicated to the so-called wheat problem. He warned that “all civilized nations stand in deadly peril of not having enough to eat,” but he saw the way out: science coming to the rescue, tapping the practically unlimited mass of nitrogen in the atmosphere (present as the unreactive molecule N2) and converting it into compounds assimilable by plants. He rightly concluded that this challenge “differs materially from other chemical discoveries which are in the air, so to speak, but are not yet matured. The fixation of nitrogen is vital to the progress of civilized humanity. Other discoveries minister to our increased intellectual comfort, luxury, or convenience; they serve to make life easier, to hasten the acquisition of wealth, or to save time, health, or worry. The fixation of nitrogen is a question of the not far-distant future.”