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| Fig. 1: Primary Energy Consumption of the U.S. Industrial Sector from 1950-2020. (Image Source: A. Woodrow, after the EIA. [4]) |
U.S. manufacturing output has grown steadily since 1946, with the largest monthly percent decrease in output in March of 2020. [1] Sustaining this level of production requires a large and continuous flow of energy.
A useful way to understand long-term energy trends in U.S. manufacturing is to examine sectors that have undergone structural change. Textile manufacturing is an example of this. While American manufacturing output has continued to rise, the domestic textile industry has largely disappeared. Around 97% of the clothes and shoes sold in the United States are now imported. [2] Since 1990, employment in U.S. textile manufacturing has fallen by about 90%, from 939,000 to 85,000 jobs. [2] As recently as 2003, however, the United States was the third-largest exporter of textiles in the world. [3]
This raises a question: how has the energy consumption of the U.S. manufacturing sector evolved, and how has the domestic textile production altered that total?
In 1950, total primary energy consumption in the U.S. industrial sector was 13,820 TBtu. By 1970, it had risen to 22,918 TBtu. In 2022, industrial energy consumption was 22,594 TBtu. [4] The sector experienced rapid growth in energy use between 1950 and 1970, followed by more than five decades of near-constant consumption, as shown in Fig. 1.
During this period of stable industrial energy demand, textiles represented only a small share of U.S. manufacturing energy use. As reported in a 2012 review, textile manufacturing accounted for less than 2% of final energy use in U.S. manufacturing. [3] It also shows that textile manufacturing has long been a minor contributor to U.S. manufacturing energy use, even as overall industrial energy consumption remained near its historical peak.
Fossil fuels (coal, natural gas, and petroleum) have dominated U.S. industrial energy supply since 1950. Over time, however, renewable sources have grown as a share of total primary energy. In 1950, renewables supplied 549 TBtu of energy, or about 4.0% of total U.S. primary energy consumption. By 2022, that share had increased to approximately 11%. [4]
This shift in the national energy mix affects manufacturing primarily through purchased electricity. Textile mills reflect this indirectly. Electricity use in textiles is concentrated in spinning, while thermal processes such as bleaching and dyeing rely mainly on fuel combustion. [3] In 2002, electricity accounted for about 39% of total primary energy consumed by the U.S. textile industry. [3] As a result, changes in the fuel mix of the U.S. electric grid directly affect a substantial fraction of the energy associated with textile manufacturing.
Total U.S. primary energy consumption in 2022 was 93.59 QBtu, or 9.87 × 1019 joules. [4] The industrial sector accounted for 22,594 TBtu, or 2.38 × 1019 joules, about 24% of the national total. [4] Despite continued growth in manufacturing output, industrial energy consumption has remained roughly constant since 1970.
Within this stable trend, textile manufacturing has sharply declined. Energy use in U.S. textile mills makes up only a small fraction of manufacturing energy consumption. Most of the energy required to produce clothing consumed in the United States is now embedded in foreign manufacturing rather than domestic industry.
The textile sector provides a clear example of how structural changes in U.S. manufacturing can significantly alter sector-level energy use without affecting total industrial energy consumption.
© Audrey Woodrow. The author warrants that the work is the author's own and that Stanford University provided no input other than typesetting and referencing guidelines. The author grants permission to copy, distribute, and display this work in unaltered form, with attribution to the author, for noncommercial purposes only. All other rights, including commercial rights, are reserved to the author.
[1] L. Mutikani, "U.S. Manufacturing Output Posts Largest Drop Since 1946," Reuters, 15 Apr 20.
[2] A. McLymore and H. Reid, "Why a Major Shift to US Clothing Production is Unlikely," Reuters, 13 Mar 25.
[3] A. Hasanbeigi and L. Price, "A Review of Energy Use and Energy Efficiency Technologies for the Textile Industry," Renew. Sustain. Energy Rev. 16, 3648 (2012).
[4] "Monthly Energy Review, November 2025," Energy Information Administration, DOE/EIA-0035(2025/11), November 2025.