I wrote:
> With cold fusion, what you want is a high power to weight ratio. A 5% > efficient engine producing 10 kW per kilogram of engine is much better than > 20% efficiency with 1 kW per kilogram. > I am talking about transportation applications here; vehicle propulsion. Mobile energy applications, such as cell phone power supplies, are not the same as transportation applications. They have a different set of rules. Energy efficiency is important even with cold fusion because you need to reduce waste heat. For milliwatt-scale mobile applications, waste heat may not matter as much. It would matter for an earphone battery replacement but perhaps not as much for a pacemaker. Large, fixed, cold fusion energy sources such as generators and HVAC systems have to be optimized for the lowest lifetime cost of equipment. That does not necessarily mean the cheapest equipment. It means the cheapest over the life of the machine. With cold fusion you only need to look at the cost of equipment. With today's conventional systems you have to look at the cost of both equipment and fuel. The rules for one application can be quite different from another. The rules for cold fusion are completely different from the ones we apply to today's energy systems. People often discuss the future of energy with cold fusion as if it will be mostly the same as today only with a lower cost. This would be like saying in 1990, "the newspaper business will be the same in 20 years except newspapers will be online with the Internet." It is a cliché to say this, but the Internet changed everything relating to information. Most people did not see it coming because they lack imagination. Cold fusion will change everything relating to energy, but on a larger scale, with more impact that the Internet had. - Jed
