Here is a brief analysis of the cost of a 1 MW palladium-based generator --
I estimate that palladium can produce ~200 W/g, so you would need 5 kg. This costs $119,000 at today's prices. An EPRI study shows that a conventional 1 MW generator costs $267,000, so this would not cost much more than a conventional generator, and it would be far cheaper than a 1 MW wind turbine. With a conventional generator, over the life of the machine, the fuel costs more than the machine. With cold fusion, the fuel cost would negligible, so lifetime costs would be far lower. The generator portion of 1 MW wind turbine costs about the same as a 1 MW combustion generator, but the tower costs $1.3 million. Yet wind is competitive with combustion generators because the fuel is free -- wind costs nothing. With cold fusion, the extra $119,000 you pay for palladium is far less than the cost of the wind turbine tower. Regarding fuel costs, high purity heavy water today costs ~$1000/kg. It will be much cheaper with cold fusion, because most of that cost is for the energy used to separate heavy water from ordinary water. 1 kg of heavy water produces 69 million megajoules of heat. A 1 MW reactor consumes 3 MJ of heat per second, so that's 23 million seconds, or 266 days, or $3.76 per day. Actually, it would be far cheaper because heavy water will be cheaper, as I said. The EPRI generator data is on p. 2-5 here: http://www.publicpower.org/files/deed/finalreportcostsofutilitydistributedgenerators.pdf - Jed
