Jed,
I have had several direct working relationships with DOE and came away
mightily unimpressed. They seem to be lacking expert knowledge and
particularly lacking in common sense. Maybe they do have some bright
people but I was not fortunate enough to meet them.
Just consider their record and why they were founded in the first
place. Consider what they have contributed in the standard fields like
solar, batteries and wind or even ITER. It seemed to me DOE is a
classic example of Pournelle's Iron Law. We offered to save them >
$100 billion in cleaning up the radwaste at Hanford but they were not
interested because they "had already made an agreement with the Governor
of Washington State and didn't want to renegotiate it." If these are
the "experts" you say know the answers, I suggest we would be better off
without them.
