SYSTEMIC INDUSTRIALIZATION
SYSTEMIC INDUSTRIALIZATION
Energy and electricity are fundamental elements of systemic industrialization, therefore, when a new damn is created it offers many opportunities for the economic development of regions and countries. Beyond the heavy metal scene, can you sense the subtle poetics of old cables and towers as it ages in an old photo?
9. HICA (Cávado river hydroelectric plant). 1945-1964. Teófilo Rego Archive, Casa da Imagem – Manuel Leão Foundation, Vila Nova de Gaia, Portugal.
The oil industry was a relevant source of energy in European countries, whether connecting its pipelines via land or via sea ships and ports. What shall be done with oil structures if we are entering the decarbonization of European countries?
10. Pipes, SACOR, portuguese oil company. 1947-1974. Teófilo Rego Archive, Casa da Imagem – Manuel Leão Foundation, Vila Nova de Gaia, Portugal.
Systemic industrialization is the aggregate of immovable assets with or without industrial networks and/or systems which allow the functioning of a given industrial activity to be understood. There are several elements that make up the industrial infrastructure: from the industrial building to private housing, industrial settlements and energy sources. There are three interconnected phases which characterise man’s relationship with technology, according to sociology studies. The successive interconnected phases are characterised by the resources and raw materials used, means of energy use, forms of production, type of workers and ways of life.
First, the eotechnical phase (10th – 17th century), then the paleotechnical phase (17th- 20th century), and lastly the neotechnical phase (which started at the beginning of the 20th century). Studies have found the relationship between technology and progress. If on the one hand society has developed different technologies to solve human problems, on the other hand the mass use of these technologies leads to dehumanisation: “however so far they have fallen short of their intrinsic possibilities, modern science and technology have bequeathed humanity at least one teaching: “nothing is impossible”.
Some theoreticians may help us concretize other notions which are vague and immaterial. For Lewis Mumford (Civilization and Technique, 1963) the introduction of the clock in the factory completely changed the notion of time and served as a model for all subsequent mechanisms: “The clock, not the steam engine, is the key machine of the modern industrial age”. The new notion of time management, turned to a new “industrial order” in which the worker and the job came to be marked by the hands of a clock. Firstly, space commands the infrastructure and the work occurs inside the industrial infrastructure where production becomes more systematised. And time became central, workers report to work at a certain hour, comply with a certain working day and working hours… Then, outside the factory, the worker started to control the time he dedicated to recreational activities and rest.