Reply To: Bill Gates

[Glenn Millam]

Transmute wrote: Not to seem laconic but “if” is the problem: if it works and if its as cheap as advertised, if not well at least it makes a nice x-ray generator :p

Quite true. “If” is the biggest problem.

Transmute wrote: One problem is that F2 powered coal to oil conversion would also become economical and competitive with F2 powered biomass to oil (hydrogenated depolymerization), biomass would not add any net CO2 to the atmosphere, coal as we all know does. So even though F2 would cure our energy problems via the automatic demand of economics, it would still require both a political and social conscience demand to make sure it also cures are environmental problems.

I don’t see biomass or coal-to-oil happening at all, if Focus Fusion occurs. Once FF (or F2, as you say) reaches a certain level of use, conventional oil prices will drop dramatically, as there will be more supply than demand, and the oil producers will want to move their product. The costs of converting coal-to-oil, even using DPFs, won’t compete with pumping oil and refining it. Think about it. You have to mine the coal, take it to the refinery, process it to remove all the sulfur and other contaminants, and convert it. Then you have to transport the fuel to market. Much of this is the same as conventional oil. Also, coal is used for other things already, such as steel production. That coal needs to last as well.

Thus, those who have regular cars will have cheaper gasoline because of it. However, if you have an electric car, the fuel costs will be so much cheaper, and the performance (acceleration, speed, noise, stink) will be so much better, that people will be attracted to it via normal market forces. Also, it would be seen as the “latest, greatest thing,” and people will want to by them the same way they want to buy big flat-panel HD TV’s over the old CRT TV’s. There will be early adopters, the bugs will get worked out, technology will improve with the additional capital and investment, and the cars will improve to the point where only the “gas-car freaks” will want one.

And there will be gas-car freaks who will hold onto their cars and keep them maintained, and sell them to each other for increasingly higher prices for many decades to come. Gasoline production may not end for another three centuries. But the amount of gasoline, the cost, and how it is distributed, will fluctuate as time goes on. Initially, gasoline will drop as there will be a spike in supply. Then, as it becomes increasingly uncompetitive, more players will merge and shrink, and the price will level out at a high level, made to supply those who have to have the need and money. As those uses that require a liquid fossil fuel decrease, gasoline refinement will become a niche industry, with limited supply networks. Only the devoted or truly needy will buy gasoline. And there it will remain, for a long time, like a small, slow burning star.

And thats OK. You see, in order to halt and reverse global warming, we don’t have to totally cease fossil fuel use. We need to reduce it down to a level where nature can handle it. Thats all. Focus Fusion alone can do it.

This is, of course, assuming that global warming is caused by human CO2 production. There is evidence that it is actually being caused by increased solar activity, which increases the amount of Solar System plasma via the solar wind. This, in turn, decreases the amount of cosmic ray radiation we get, which lessens cloud formation, thus increasing global temperature. This increase in solar activity is normal and cyclic, and is thought to reverse itself naturally. Even then, the point is moot, as we need Focus Fusion for far more than just reducing CO2 emissions.