LENR would be quite disruptive if it even replaced 10 percent of the world energy supply over the next twenty years. If it turns out to be bona fide and something that can be commercialized (hopefully we'll get a sense of this soon), and barring some unforeseen impediment to its widespread adoption, it's not difficult to imagine that it could replace well beyond 10 percent of the energy supply over time.
As a thought experiment, assume that LENR effectively makes energy free during the next 100 years. Find some activity of concern to the majority of people on the planet that is limited in some way by scarcity -- agricultural production, water distribution, the generation of heat and electricity, heavy manufacturing, transportation, housing. The cost of these activities would go down significantly. It's hard to even get a sense of what the implications of such a development would be. Now consider the possibility of mass scale production of isotopes by way of controlled transmutation. It would be an understatement to say that this would be disruptive. Precious metals would become commodities, and the already tenuous connection between gold and silver and the monetary supply would probably be broken. But more worryingly, it might be possible to order up as much uranium-235 as you want. So for the sake of widespread, unencumbered adoption of LENR, let's hope that energy production becomes easy and transmutation of heavier elements proves to be difficult or impossible. Eric On Sun, Jan 15, 2012 at 9:54 PM, Mark Iverson-ZeroPoint < zeropo...@charter.net> wrote: > AussieGuy wrote:**** > > “Transmutation of elements via the FPE may replace mining.”**** > > ** ** > > It’ll do more than that… it’ll kill the entire precious metals business > which has been a foundation for countries’ **monetary systems**. What > affect that will have on economic systems, and countries, is probably not > going to be pretty… in the beginning.**** > > ** ** > > With energy being extremely cheap, it will drive down the cost of just > about everything from raw materials to completed products… and it’ll be > much cheaper to transport those things to the point of consumption, so > we’re talking about much lower cost for most **everything**. It > wouldn’t surprise me if govts stepped in to bring in the changes > gradually… But how does one decide what to do when this is probably unlike > anything that has ever happened; nothing to go on.**** > > ** ** > > **To call LENR a ‘disruptive’ technology doesn’t even begin to describe > it!** **** > > ** ** > > -Mark**** > > ** ** >
