$200 a Barrel or Bust: the Oil Price Spike

Surprisingly yours is one of the few articles mentioning solar. The potential of solar thermal is huge. The US has vast deserts, using only a small fraction of them for power production would easily provide for our energy needs. While bulkier than nuclear plants, economies of scale will likely make solar thermal far cheaper. Heat energy can be stored and used to produce power on demand, this makes these plants far more grid friendly than wind.

On the other except for passenger airliners I don't see hydrogen as a practical fuel, a passenger jet is big enough to deal with liquid hydrogen. Most commutes can be done with a combination of electric transit and electric cars. For that matter car ferries that recharge your car as you travel at 150Mph toward your destination. Lithium batteries provided the break through needed for practical electric cars. I expect the price to come down as large batteries are built specifically for cars rather than diverted from laptop use.

Larry of CA 6:07PM May 21, 2008