Struggle in the Steam Age

"As I said, Earl. You are really good at managing your own territory." On the way back to the city, Viscount Surrey said to Lawrence with a look of admiration on his face.

"I really didn't expect that you would be able to send a new industry to our island in such a short period of time, and this industry could be connected to another industry that can be said to be the lifeblood of the entire island." industry."

"Actually, it's not lifeblood. After all, you can solve the fatal vitamin deficiency problem by eating those mosses or lichens." Lawrence said seriously.

"Of course, we are human beings after all, not reindeer. So when we can eat more delicious vegetables, it is better to eat as little as possible those ground firsts or mosses with high oxalic acid content."

After returning to the city, the Viscount Surrey immediately mobilized the workshops and factories under his command to produce various equipment and supporting coal stoves for making briquettes.

In just three days, more than 500 coal stoves, together with a large number of briquette manufacturing tools, were distributed to various areas of the territory for trial use.

For example, the newly built greenhouses around the core city canceled the complicated geothermal pipelines in the original design and replaced them with several honeycomb coal stoves.

"In some large greenhouses, I feel that the effect of this briquette stove is not very obvious." After inspecting several greenhouses of different sizes and locations. Lawrence and the others quickly saw how well these new products worked.

"But for those small greenhouses, the briquette stove is indeed much better than the brazier and complicated heating pipes."

"Yes, the new product performs better than traditional warming methods when warming a small space. But the effect is not very good when faced with a larger space."

Lawrence also nodded at the side at this time and said. "So when we promote this kind of briquette, it's better to target those small spaces."

"This is already very good." Compared with Lawrence, who felt that this place was somewhat inadequate, Viscount Surrey was very satisfied with the current situation.

At least for him, the only two large cities in the territory, Surrey Fort and Northport, have warm currents and geothermal heat to help heat up, and the overall does not need too many artificial means of warming. So his demand for those large-scale heating facilities is not very large.

On the contrary, there is a need for some stable, efficient and cheap heating means for small settlements to strengthen the actual control of the territory.

If you want to control a territory, it is not enough to just draw the boundaries on the map, you also need to have enough people to live on it.

For example, on the land of tens of thousands of square kilometers in the Viscount Surrey, two towns and a coal mine have concentrated more than 90% of the manpower in the area, which naturally leads to serious abandonment in other places in the territory. .

And this situation also occurs in various territories of the entire Green Island. Whether it is the territory directly under the kingdom, the territory of the royal family, or the territories of other nobles, the entire island has a population distribution method in which most of the population is concentrated in towns.

If it weren't for the Noble Law and the Exploitation Law that specifically indicated that the territory would be confiscated if it was not developed to a certain extent after a certain number of years, then the population of this island is estimated to be less than 1/10 of the existing population.

And this kind of personnel distribution has seriously affected the development progress of the entire region. On the one hand, those cities that rely on some heat to build are limited in scale after all, so the number of people they can accommodate is also limited.

On the other hand, large tracts of wilderness had to be abandoned due to lack of manpower. This naturally affects the development of this territory.

For example, this is the case with the coal mine discovered this time in the Viscount of Surrey. According to the prospecting team, this kind of shallow coal mine capable of large-scale open-pit mining is actually very easy to find.

However, due to the sparse population distribution in this area, even the Viscount Surrey's family has been operating here for three generations without realizing that there are minerals here.

And now the most critical advantage of the briquette and briquette stove that Lawrence has worked out is here.

With these flexible and cheap fuel heating tools, the Viscount Surrey, or the lords of the entire island, can greatly expand the scope of activities of the subjects under their command, and then develop those areas that have never been developed before. H.

This is why Viscount Surrey looked so excited after seeing this humble little invention. After all, for people in this area, temperature is the most important reason that prevents everyone from developing their territory.

And if this problem can be solved, even if it is only partially solved, then this region should be able to usher in a new development climax in a very short period of time.

As for the problem of wilderness races or beasts that are very troublesome for most territories, it is not so serious here, because this area is so barren that it is difficult for those wildernesses to exist in the wild on a large scale.

For example, the biggest threat on Green Island now is some of the white dragons and vassal kobolds entrenched on the island, but they are basically all entrenched in the north to fish for a living, and there is not much communication with these colonial points in the south.

White dragons would occasionally leave their lairs and come to the south to attack the settlements of intelligent creatures, but after having gunpowder weapons capable of bursting fire and special anti-aircraft gun racks, such attacks were significantly less.

As for the kobolds, the nearly 100 kilometers of uninhabited frigid wasteland between their dens and the northernmost human settlement has prevented them from going south.

As for the Viscount Surrey himself, let alone how much money he can make as the only large coal mine owner on the two islands, how much profit he can make by opening up those undeveloped areas.

The favor shared between this matter and Lawrence's relationship is enough to make him useless for a long time to come.

After realizing the significance of these unimportant objects in this world, in the next few days, Lawrence began to search for knowledge about living in cold regions in his impression.

As an existence that is not good at living in cold regions, humans in this world have also invented many ways to help them live in this region.

For example, all kinds of sleds and snowshoes used to move in snow-covered areas, and for example, in addition to using buildings with thick walls and reduced doors and windows to shelter from wind and cold in the wild.

In addition to this, there are several very special areas in this region that are kept internally functioning by even rarer rare supernatural powers.

For example, in the east of the island, there is a dwarf tribe under a kingdom that relies on a dwarf-specific magic circle inside, because there is no geothermal heat available where they find minerals.

For another example, in the farther north, several spellcaster organizations have also built some bases to cultivate some animals and plants that grow in the cold zone. And in those bases belonging to the spellcasters, the spellcasters directly used the power of underground magma or even elements to power the entire facility.

With enough energy, these outposts are all achieved by a series of magic barriers for defense and heat preservation.

Compared with other methods, this method can be said to be the most environmentally friendly and has the best effect. However, the corresponding initial investment is astonishingly large.

According to the Viscount Surrey, it is estimated that if he completely sells his Fort Surrey, he can only afford a set of pocket barriers that can support the lives of at most two or three hundred people.

Obviously, this kind of heat preservation and life support system with the characteristics of this world is basically impossible to promote on a large scale due to cost reasons.

And in this case, the series of methods in Lawrence's mind that can prevent the cold without extraordinary strength will naturally come in handy.