🚀 go-pugleaf

To: >INTERNET:fusion@zorch.sf-bay.org

This is a dicey area because when a commodity gets too cheap, overall
industry profits fall. The old-line leaders suffer a lot, and the johnnie-
come-lately's also get hit. We have seen this during the past few years in
the computer business. If the world market for energy is two trillion dollars
(?), 15 years after CF it might collapse into only 10 billion, and a decade
later, the total cost of fuel worldwide will be zero dollars. (That is fuel,
not equipment). After 2020, selling energy will be exactly like trying to
sell ice to eskimos.

Energy intensive products like aluminum will drop in price, which will
initially help ALCOA, but after a while, the overall market will be
saturated, the competition will grow, and ALCOA will suffer for the same
reason the microcomputer hurt IBM. A company that makes airplanes out of
aluminum might do better.


Randy Burns writes:

"...after some breakthrough in energy technology unless the non-energy uses
of oil (i.e. making plastics and fabrics) expanded dramatically in response
to cheaper energy prices."

I think this is incorrect. I have talked to oil experts, and I gather that if
CF works, and the cost of energy drops by a factor of, say, 100000, chemists
would quickly find ways to synthesize hydrocarbons on site, from local
sources of hydrogen and carbon (sources like air). This would be the reverse
of burning gasoline, and it would require enormous amounts of energy, but
that would not make the slightest bit of difference. The reasons they would
manufacture oil on site are: 1. It is far safer than shipping the stuff
around; 2. It is easier; 3. It provides 'just-in-time' inventory so that you
do not need large explosive stocks sitting around; 4. The quality of the
synthetic product would be much better than the natural product, there would
be fewer impurities; 5. It would pollute less than oil refining.

As soon as people wake up and realize that CF real, the price of oil, natural
gas, and uranium will collapse, never to recover. The price will be
discounted to reflect the future drop in use; there will no need to hoard
current stock, or explore for additional supplies.

- Jed