Indeed, crude oil is probably far too valuable to be wasted by burning it! Even if fusion power were suddenly globally available tomorrow, there would still be a strong demand for oil as the basis for chemical processes.
But this will all be a slow transition, the invention of the first steam engine did not mean that all horse or man-powered devices were obsolete the same day, OK, yes well, technically I suppose they were obsolete, but demand for them carried on for some time - because it takes a while for new technology to work its way round.
So what has been achieved, a fusion process has put out more energy than was put in? Yes OK we all knew that this was possible (there is a good example of this some 150 million Km away), but this is the first time it has been done, deliberately, artificially, here, on Earth, by humans.
Making it useful, ie large scale energy production is still, what 30 years away! It is quite possible that the inertial confinement process will prove to be a dead end for technical or mechanical reasons, let’s see what ITER does when completed. There is plenty of time for established industries to gradually change and evolve.
I’m not generally a big optimist, but I do feel that when humans or ‘society’ really, really puts their minds to doing something, we really can achieve remarkable results.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
