The implications are huge, if it can be re-created. The Arab’s power will dissolve into nothing. Oil will be worthless. Unfortunately, there have been so many cold fusion hoaxes over the years, I remain skeptical.
The left would want to supress this energy source if it works out as viable, this is because they think that giving humanity a cheaped form of energy would be in their own words “like giving a machine gun to a retarded child” - Paul Elrich.
I think it would be a boon to our increasingly technological society.
Based on some of the other stupid comments here - few recall things done in Rome/Italy that seemed beyond impossible. Rome was about 500 years ahead of the western world.
A recent example is an Italian doctor who discovered a cure for MS which eluded all other experts. He is now being attacked by the drug companies because useless MS drugs are a tens of billion industry.
I think I trust The University of Bologna more than Penn State or Univ of Virginia where “Dr.” Michael Mann scammed U.S. taxpayers with his fraudulent global warming research.
I think Italian universities probably have more credibility as they probably have fewer courses in nonsense like “women’s studies.”
No. The price will come down gradually because you can't put nickel metal in a car's gas tank, but it will drop to a stable (lower) price and stay there because it'll still be in great demand as a raw material for synthesizing... well, pretty much any organic chemicals we use in bulk.
Cold fusion won't take away our demand for polyester, or asphalt, or butyl rubber, or Teflon, or fertilizers, or... well, you get the picture.
Oil won’t be worthless, but it’s value will go down rapidly and it will be used to make lubricating oils, greases, LPG, and plastics. It will also take decades to transfer from oil based transportation to electricity based transportation. One of the biggest problems to be overcome is batteries that store large amounts of electricity and can be recharged quickly. Also you have to greatly increase the ability to transfer electrical power to make up for the increased draw on the grid.
P.S. Coal and natural gas will be obsolete almost immediately because both coal and natural gas are used mainly for electrical energy production.