Well, my scenario was thought from a perspective of e-cat technology, not deuterium-based cold fusion. And I do agree with almost everything you say about costs. The point is: how long does it take? Not every family, company nor country is wealth enough to just give it up on old technology and adopt new ones, even if the new one is way much cheaper to mantain. There is a sunk cost that needs to be recovered.
That's why companies who have a large amount of it's costs related to energy much more likely to adopt the technology first. Then old-fashioned technology prices will drop, making it less urgent for other energy consumers to rush into the new technology. Real cost of oil to Saudi Arabia is not US$ 100 per barrel. It's way, way cheaper. It's just that they make more money selling it to USA, Europe or China than burning it on their backyards. Opportunity cost is what makes oil expensive to saudis and russians, not "real" cost of obtaining oil. Eventually, when the technology goes mature, we'll see e-cats used in large scale in Saudi Arabia. As to the keynote speaker on the National Association of Carriage Builders, he was not wrong. Cars were very expensive those days. What made his speech stupid was not the car itself, but the astonishing productivity of Ford's assembly line. Of course, cars were much more efficient than carriage. *Carriages were doomed anyway*, but what made their market disappear so fast was Henry Ford, not Ford Model T. Best regards, Bruno 2011/10/21 Jed Rothwell <jedrothw...@gmail.com> > >> > > Why would they continue using energy that costs far more than cold fusion? > This is like suggesting that a nation that happens to have a lot of silicon > to make glass will go on using vacuum tube computers long after transistors > are invented. Or that a nation that has lots of grass will go on using > horses rather than automobiles. > (...) > When a new technology is far cheaper and more convenient for everyone, the > old technology vanishes within a generation. Power grids will be no > exception. The power companies will have no customers and no revenues. > > - Jed > >
