On 5/6, we went to see the relocated historical Zaandijk Zaanse Schans here in the Netherlands. At this site, the iconic Dutch windmills were first deployed.

These historical feats of engineering took wind, a free source of energy, used the sails to convert it into rotational motion, and then a series of gears to turn it into horizontal motion. This was frequently used to saw many planks of wood at once, which is what allowed the Dutch to become master shipbuilders during the 17th century. In fact, during the peak of the Dutch golden age, their navy rivaled even England’s, the world’s finest at the time. This also enabled the Dutch to travel the world and incorporate seafaring as a large component of their culture and history throughout the centuries, contributing to their historical dominance in the global spice trade and other such matters. It was also easy to attach an Archimedes screw to the windmill to pump water out of the land, creating the very first Dutch polders. This created excellent grazing lands for the Dutch which allowed cheese to become a highlight of Dutch cuisine, and continues to this day in Dutch dominance in engineering ways to redirect water off of their land.

The Zaandijk Zaanse Schans is a very early and important example of sustainability. Wind is a renewable energy source, and early Dutch windmills were among the first pieces of technology to make use of it. They were able to take clean energy from the environment and use it to create useful spaces for farming and industrialization instead of consuming more environmentally valuable land elsewhere. While sustainability was perhaps not the greatest concern in the 16th and 17th centuries when windmills were first deployed, they remain an excellent and early precedent of harvesting wind to create clean energy for generations to come.