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Short abstract:

This paper explores how thermal regimes shape national economies and the workforce. By analysing how far job creation drove the design of Britain's thermal infrastructure in the 1970s and 80s, it argues that warmth has been as much about keeping the population in work as preserving bodily comfort.

Long abstract:

Up until the second world war, warmth was a major stimulus to the British economy and workforce. In 1953 the National Coal Board (NCB) employed 713,000 miners, with roughly 20% of the coal supply used in coal fires to keep British homes warm. With the growth of gas and oil central heating in the 1960s and 1970s, the link between a distinctive thermal regime and its labour force collapsed. This paper will uncover how the (NCB) and the National Union of Miners (NUM) fought to preserve the labour-intensive nature of heat throughout the 1970s and 1980s, looking at their promotion of district heating systems as an employment generator. The NCB and the NUM actively lobbied councils, housing associations, and even provided interest free loans sacrificed from wages to establish district heating systems run on solid fuel. Ultimately, these efforts were unsuccessful as gas became the dominant heating method for British homes. The conceptual relationship between heat and work was not lost, however. Over the 1980s inner-city home installation programmes that emerged as part of the government’s energy efficiency programme stressed the importance of ‘warmth’ as a critical area of job creation. By highlighting how the battle over Britain’s thermal infrastructure was fought on the grounds of labour-intensity (and how much work warmth could generate) this paper will highlight the role of ‘thermal regimes’ in shaping national economies and the workforce.