# Hydrogen economy -\> dead Earth?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-economy-dead-earth/498951>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [June 6, 2009, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-economy-dead-earth/498951 "2009-06-06T21:09:06Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![WarmNPrickly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/d78d45/32.png) [@WarmNPrickly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WarmNPrickly)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-economy-dead-earth/498951/41 "2009-07-14T18:12:29Z")

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> [@constanze](#):
>
> Based on what? I’m genuinly curious, because since the cold fusion (cheat) debacle, I haven’t heard of any progress in that direction. I assume you aren’t thinking of hot nuclear fusion, which happens in the sun, because that would require a lot of heat and pressure.

The debate on Pons and Fleishman is not a closed and shut case as many beleive. There is no debate that their media frenzy was very poor science, but recent investigations have at least suggested there might be something there. There is no controversy on [pyroelectric fusion](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyroelectric_fusion) however.

Of course, even if cold fusion is real, neither of these fusion techniques are useful for generating power. For that you need hot fusion. Hot fusion plants are being tested. At the moment they take more energy than they produce. [ITER](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITER)

I agree that it is premature to state that we will have fusion plants in 100 years.

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**Author:** ![dracoi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/90db22/32.png) [@dracoi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dracoi)\
**Post date:** [July 15, 2009, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-economy-dead-earth/498951/42 "2009-07-15T21:28:01Z")

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> [@constanze](#):
>
> Based on what? I’m genuinly curious, because since the cold fusion (cheat) debacle, I haven’t heard of any progress in that direction. I assume you aren’t thinking of hot nuclear fusion, which happens in the sun, because that would require a lot of heat and pressure.

[ITER](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITER) is an international project underway in Europe now to produce a reactor that will test a lot of theories regarding hot fusion and its viability as an energy source. I think the completion date is somewhere around 2018. Even optimists doubt we’ll have anything that could be put into full-scale production before 2050, so it’s not going to solve problems right away. But, Brazil’s comment in expecting it by the end of the century is a reasonably safe bet.

I think you’re right that cold fusion is a dead end energy-wise.

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**Author:** ![constanze](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f9ae1b/32.png) [@constanze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/constanze)\
**Post date:** [July 16, 2009, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-economy-dead-earth/498951/43 "2009-07-16T22:14:12Z")

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Interesting, thanks for that info.

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