I don't agree with all the prescriptions presented. However, his outline of the problem is good for some critical thinking. The secret word is Terawatt. But a terawatt is only a rate of delivery. To be really useful it has to be ready to go when you need it. That would be terawatt-hours. And terawatt-days. And terawatt-months. And terawatt-years. And then comes reliability. Can the production be sustained? What is the up time? Is the resource seasonal? Can it be matched to demand?

I do like his idea about upping the research budget to $10 billion a year. I know. A quick ramp up will encourage a lot of waste. The problem is that you never know where a good idea will come from. Suppose we spend that amount in inflation adjusted dollars for 20 years. That is $200 billion. Suppose we only get a significant pay off from 10%. If that 10% covers even half our energy supplies (i.e. what ever technology that is developed is cheaper than the alternatives) it will have paid for itself.

There are a lot of interesting ideas available. Pebble Bed Reactors, Molten Salt Reactors, and others.

We need to phase out subsidies for solar and wind. When they become economical they will roll out on their own.

My thoughts? Well they drift back as always to The Polywell Fusion Reactor.

You can learn the basics of fusion energy by reading Principles of Fusion Energy: An Introduction to Fusion Energy for Students of Science and Engineering

Polywell is a little more complicated. You can learn more about Polywell and its potential at: Bussard's IEC Fusion Technology (Polywell Fusion) Explained

The American Thinker has a good article up with the basics.

Why hasn't Polywell Fusion been fully funded by the Obama administration?

Cross Posted at Power and Control