Replacing all that energy seems very unlikely... It only seems politically unlikely. Even at the highest estimates of 6 billion USD per 1GW plant, building 50

Replacing all that energy seems very unlikely... It only seems politically unlikely. Even at the highest estimates of 6 billion USD per 1GW plant, building 500 of them would provide 4Twh per year [1], almost as much as the 4.4Twh that the US now generates, and for about the cost of the Iraq and Afganistan wars. We already know the US could have spent this much money: it did. The US could have spent that money on nuclear, or it could have spent it on lofting solar power satellites, or even massive solar installations, and any of those would have essentially erased our dependence on oil, at least. But even though it wasn't spent on that, all is not lost! Current coal reserves are good, energy-wise (not necessarily environmentally) for at least a hundred years, which gives plenty of time to grow a space-based energy policy, or to make a policy about nuclear power that makes sense, or whatever. Maybe Lomborg makes these points in the article; it seemed as though he was only saying things I agreed with, so I didn't finish. [1] this assumes that each one is operational for 11 months of the year, and that they do something useful like providing energy for methane for gasoline replacement during trough times of day