It's possible that absent coal, oil, or natural gas we would have leap frogged directly into solar power first with directed mirrors powering a liquid turbine, wind, and eventually conventional solar panels made from silicone.

There's really no reason to use fossil fuels. The fact that we do actually let's us waste a ton of it. If we had to ration it to the bare essentials we'd be able to get away with using only 5% of the energy we currently use. Our current solar energy production in the United States is 2% but that 2% would have been more than enough to power the entire country in the 1920s.