In this video, we're exploring the origins of everyone's favorite Christmas present, Cole. We're digging into its history and significance while attempting to mine my own, for the ultimate stocking suffer, the fuel of the Industrial Revolution. Everything we use comes from 8,000 generations of collective innovation and discovery, but could an average person figure it all out themselves and work their way in the Stone Age to today? That's a question we're exploring. Each week, I try to take the next step forward in human history. My name is Andy and this is How to Make Everything. Cole is produced by the conversion of a plant matter of dense forests that used to populate the earth. Cole has been formed from most geological periods, but 90% of it came from two periods, 360 to 250 million years ago. Mostly composed of carbon, it is formed from plant matter, the decays and depeats, and then is converted into coal by heat and pressure by being buried. The earliest records of its used by humans, dates to 3,500 BCE in China, and was widely used by many civilizations wherever it was available. Most early use was just easily accessible surface deposits. Charcoal and coal share many properties, but coal has a few advantages. The first was it was ready made. Charcoal requires vast forests to source for wood and then a laborious burning process. Cole could be dug straight up from the earth and then burned, so it was used only when mining was cheaper than charcoal production. But it is also more energy dense, producing a hotter fire more consistently. The real value coal really peaked during the Industrial Revolution, while many forces combine together to allow the invention and proliferation of the coal-powered steam engine. While today quickly shrinking and relevance, Cole still produces 27% of the world's power. With the steam engine as my primary goal of the reset series, Cole is most definitely crucial. Eventually it may power my steam engine, but now first in the early iron age, it also has uses as a more effective fuel for smelting and borgian iron. So I want some of that. A constant goal for this series since the beginning has been to explore the origin and sources for the ingredients to be used every day. But when it comes to metals and other minerals, that's always been proven to be a challenge, as really many of them may found just on the surface of the earth. Needing to go deeper underground into mines then becomes necessary, but also proves difficult for a variety of reasons. At this point I've made it to around 7 mines. Some are mines that have been closed down and now offer tours, most often not allowing you to actually mine them anymore, however there was one exception with adventure mine, where they let us mine our own native copper, and even operate some of their mining equipment. I've also made it into one active mine, the Redmond Real Salt mines in Utah, where I got a tour and was allowed to harvest a small sample. Beyond that the best bet has been abandoned mines, which require a fair amount of risk and off-roading, as well as some questionable legalities. And when even that fails I can sometimes scrounge some of the sources from their discarded tailings outside the mine. In the end, getting access to a large supply of minerals has always been next to impossible. That's why I made it a caveat since the beginning of the reset that I only need to source an initial sample of the mineral, before unlocking a larger store-bought supply. As anything more is basically impossible in the current modern world, and even with that coal has remained a challenge, and our request to several mines and sites have gone pretty much unanswered. So when we heard about an abandoned coal mine right next to San Francisco, I want to check it out and see if we could collect even a small amount. So after a very fruitful trip around California a few years ago, where we got to collect a large variety of minerals and plants, collaborate with several YouTubers, and check out a few variety of power sources for upcoming inspiration. On our very last stop of the trip, I wanted to get some coal. Discovered in 1991 off the bluffs right next to San Francisco, this mine was tunneled around 200 feet, but then never really developed into a full mining venture. Since then most of the tunnel has collapsed and the entrance is pretty difficult to access now. To make things even more difficult, the access is only reachable during low tide. Linger too long and you might find yourself swimming back to shore. We talked to one adventurer who had recently explored it for suggestions of how to get into it. They recommended only attempting if you have experienced climbing knowledge, which I don't have, or to get a ladder. So we equipped with the biggest ladder I could rent. I tried to make it in during the one window we had while there was low tide. All right so I'm here at an abandoned coal mine. We have a great beautiful view of the Golden Gate Bridge right over there and this is supposedly prospected back during the gold rush early days of San Francisco and has been abandoned and it's only accessible from up there. Inside there's a rope, you can climb your way up. The rope climb was never my strong suit in school, so I brought a ladder so I hope I can get up there and get some coal. See if I can knock some loose, take it home with me. Hope it's big enough. Seriously. All right well that's it short. I don't know. It was still a 10-foot climb, so about an 18-foot ladder. It's more like 20 feet. What about even? 25? I don't know if I can reach it. So turning it to the actual cave was a complete logistical failure. Should we probably bring a ladder? Or at least someone who's a professional climber, probably can easily make it up there. I am not. I also doesn't help that I cut up my hand getting bamboo the other day. Sorry I can't even grip that well. I'd have been able to make into some of them, but I'm not confident enough to risk my life. Over upon a cave nearby here and it's got, well it looks like it might be a few pieces of the coal they've been sticking through and it might be all the harvest. At least a few pieces of coal. I've never actually seen it before, so I'm going to guess that this is probably coal. Take it home. See if it actually does anything. That was like coal. Damn, that was a little bit here. Let's take the whole thing. It's kind of like charcoal, which I think is a good sign. It comes out nicely. That has to be cool. Is this the clean stuff? I really like this. All right so I didn't make it up to the mine, but I did manage to get a small quantity of coal. All right, got my crystal shopping done for this year. I just walked straight into the water. While I was able to collect a small sample of coal from the cliff surface in San Francisco, a larger supply of more pure coal would be ideal. I was fortunate to have a friend who was able to gain some limited access to the Falkkirk Open Pit mine in North Dakota. And graciously collected a bucket of coal from me straight from the mine. Hopefully I'll be able to make a trip out there myself soon in less turbulent times. For a quick comparison, we burned some of the charcoal and then some of the coal to compare the different burning intensities and see if we can measure some of the temperature differences. Charcoal max is out at around 2300 degrees Fahrenheit, where coal is able to reach temperatures up to 3500 degrees Fahrenheit. All right so here we have the coal. And next to it, for comparison we have charcoal. And visually they're almost impossible to tell the difference. The most noticeable difference is that this stuff is heavier. Almost like a rock, which it is a rock. There's a lot more compacted, just about millions of years of pressure that turned into coal. So with this we should be able to get an even hotter fire that will be very useful for forging, smelting, and eventually a steam engine. It's probably the both pretty much the same, largely carbon, but there is a lot of just trace elements in coal that could eventually be used for things like some of the first forms of plastic. This is some of the higher grade stuff Martin got from me in North Dakota. This is the stuff I got in San Francisco just on the surface there. Probably not the highest grade, but that's what happens when you're just on the surface. This is probably doing a little flame test, I can tell some of it is not actually coal, but but some of it definitely is, although obviously not the best grade of coal. So this may have become known as the gift for the naughty children, but as a gift to humanity itself it was a crucial building block for the eventual industrial revolution and the steam engine. Now having this crucial fuel, the next steps will be building a brick forge to use the actual coal in, as well as needing to build a more efficient bellows to provide enough oxygen. Merry Christmas, Merry Zagmuck. Thanks for watching. If you enjoyed this video, be sure to subscribe and check out other content we have covering a wide variety of topics. Also, if you've enjoyed this series, consider supporting us on Patreon. We are largely a fan-funded channel and depend on the support of our viewers in order to keep our series going. Thanks for watching.