If 2022 has demonstrated anything, it is that the abundance, and price, of energy is vital for the health of the global economy.
The Industrial Revolution that emerged in the 18th century had many causes but the necessary precondition was the replacement of human and animal power with a carbon-based fuel in the form of coal. In the 19th and 20th centuries, the global economy was transformed by the use of oil in transport and elsewhere and by the harnessing of electricity.
In the modern era, the post-1945 recovery in Europe and the US was assisted by a quarter-century of cheap oil. The lurch into stagflation in the mid-1970s was associated with the quadrupling of oil prices by Opec in 1973 and the 1980s rebound coincided with another slump in the crude price. Finally, there was a further surge in the oil price before the financial crisis of 2007-09.