Stories of Innovation: Electricity in the City

Cécile Haag, Onshore Power Architect: And then there was light! I’ve got one minute to tell you about the beginnings of municipal electricity. Let’s start!

Welcome to Stories of Innovation, a series of podcasts from TotalEnergies. In each episode, our employees explain how the innovations that have changed the world of energy came to light. Want to find out more? Let's go!

Cécile Haag: I’m talking about light because that was the first electric invention, with the electric light bulb. Thomas Edison invented this in 1879. Edison was American, so the first electrified city in the world was, drum roll… New York! In 1882, Edison built Pearl Street Station, the very first power plant, which generated electricity by burning coal. New York was followed by Paris, then London and Berlin… Electricity gradually replaced gas for street lighting at the end of the 19^th century, marking an industrial and social revolution! In France, light was brought into people’s homes in the form of the "lampe populaire", a single light bulb distributed to each household, which had to be turned off by 11:00 pm! And that is how, starting with light, the scientific curiosity of electricity became an essential part of our everyday life.

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