Department of Agriculture

[Lissa]

And as to some of your comments, yes, Fusion isn't getting the funding it should, but take 200 to 300 years, hardly. You haven't been following what's going on at Lawerence Livermore here in the US or at Princeton not to mention what's going on at JET (Joint European Torus) in Oxfordshire, UK. JET is actually the furthest along at this time and has been creating more power than they use, but it's miniscule, mostly because they can't keep the confinement going long enough. But will it take 200 years, no way, 50 years maybe and that's being conservative (more likely we'll see it in the next 30 to 40 years).

Some comments based on internet knowledge.
Fusion receives more public funding than any other energy source. Of course looking at the potential this is not strange. So I woll not make any negative comments about that rather than the fact that there is indeed a nice funding for this research.

About timeline. Some sources say that in 2050 we should have the first commercial fusion reactor working.
Looking at the time it takes to build a new fission reactor (know technology) this to me seems be an absurdly positive estimation.
Man, bringing a new shampoo to the market costs a company 3 years alone.

As is obvious we cannot use a 40 year gap (using the most positive estimates) be a basis for our future energy use. Don't forget, solar and wind power use technologies that are available now..
And what are we talking about (using the most negative estimation) paying 20 cents more to do one washing in your washing machine?

As a final note. It will of course be an obvious thing that fusion will be the major energy source once we are able to make it work. Untill that time we have no other choice but to increase the share of solar and wind power.

The fact that JET is producing more power than consuming says we're closer that you realize. The problem right now is control of the magnetic bubble holding the plasma. JET can maintain the bubble long enough to produce more power, but it's not staying up for more than a few seconds before control of the bubble is lost and in those few seconds, they're producing around just over 10 MW of power and JET consumes just shy of 10 MW of power (the difference is in the 100s of watts right now, so not really viable). Once they work out maintaining the bubble long enough, Fusion will become a reality and it's not going to take another 40+ years to figure that out (considering CERN just found Higgs to 5 sigmas, just have to nail down the actual energy where Higgs shows up). As knowledge increases and material science also increases, we'll get there more quickly.

You're forgetting the most basic problems with both Wind and Solar, they can only reach maximum efficiency is specific areas. As was noted earlier in this thread, the incident solar radiation to best spots on Earth (fewest cloudy days a year, largest time in daylight) gets a maximum of 100 W per square foot (or about ~1 kW per square meter) which is before you take into account efficiency. With Solar presently being around 20% efficiency, that means it takes 5 m^2 to get 1 kW of energy. Again, this is the best locations on Earth. It gets worse with less optimal locations around the world.

Wind is in a similar situation. You need a good amount of air movement for it to be most efficient.

Similarly, the other alternative power sources have the same issue, the most efficient means to production can either only be done on small scale or in specific areas. This is why things like Nuclear and Fossil fuels exist, because they can be efficient pretty much anywhere and they're dense on production. So while alternative power sources are nice on the small scale (like a home), they don't work for large power consuming, dense areas like cities.