The consideration of energy quality was a fundamental driver of industrialization from the 18th through 20th centuries. Consider for example the industrialization of New England in the 18th century. This refers to the construction of textile mills containing power looms for weaving cloth. The simplest, most economical and straightforward source of energy was provided by water wheels, extracting energy from a millpond behind a dam on a local creek. If another nearby landowner also decided to build a mill on the same creek, the construction of their dam would lower the overall hydraulic head to power the existing waterwheel, thus hurting power generation and efficiency. This eventually became an issue endemic to the entire region, reducing the overall profitability of older mills as newer ones were built. The search for higher quality energy was a major impetus throughout the 19th and 20th centuries. For example, burning coal to make steam to generate mechanical energy would not have been imaginable in the 18th century; by the end of the 19th century, the use of water wheels was long outmoded. Similarly, the quality of energy from electricity offers immense advantages over steam, but did not become economic or practical until the 20th century.