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Comment by JohnBerea | Hacker News Reader

Let's say this all works out and over the next few decades fusion replaces all other electricity generation, and we're past the point where all the initial infrastructure costs have been paid for.

How much will my electric bill be reduced?

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If you live in California, even if electricity generation cost nothing at all it would still only lower your bill by ~15%. Transmission & distribution of electricity is the expensive part not generating it. It doesn’t need to be expensive, yet here we are.

Initial investment cost to build reactors would in all likelihood be very high just by the nature of these being some of the most complex machines on the planet. It seems unlikely any sort of fast manufacturing line could be created to build these, and they’d all likely be built one at a time like fission reactors.

Running costs and maintenance would also be high, the fuel alone is expensive (right now), and I’ve heard that wear and tear on parts of the reactors can be high so much of the housing for the reactor would need to be replaced with time.

You’ve probably also got a small army of engineers running each one of these reactors you’ve got to pay.

All that said, the energy produced via fusion is EXTREMELY abundant. I imagine with later reactor iterations (after supply chains have been setup and electrical transportation routes upgrades) electricity could become very cheap even relative to renewables.

This is kind of a silly question given the time horizons and other potential factors that can crop up in 30 years, but my electric bill has separate charges for generation and delivery. Even if generation drops by 90%, it'd still only cut my bill in half.

i doubt your electric bill would be reduced at all. It would probably increase at a more constant rate instead of dramatic ups and downs though. So there's that..

  > How much will my electric bill be reduced?

Your bill will be the same, or higher. But you'll be doing so much more with electricity. Push a button, and your clothes are clean in seconds. Push a button, and your beard is shaved in seconds. Push a button, and four of your five senses are entertained for hours.

Why cant you currently do those things then?

I'm unaware of a clothes washing machine currently on the market that finishes the job in seconds. I believe that the technology has yet to be introduced.

When it is, how many seconds-long washings will my cheaply-made shirts survive? My guess is nearly one.

I suppose that you don't remember when the microwave oven was introduced. Food warm in 60 seconds? Nuking it? It will destroy all the nutritional value, it was said. I remember people, including my family, excusing the fact that we owned a microwave oven with the phrase "hospitals use it".

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