David said:
Since I have never seen even a scrap of reasonable prognostication about energy technology on the Internet, I would like to put down a brief synopsis of the future as I see it.
Fission is going to die a well-deserved death. The reasons are simple:
1. It is too expensive and not competitive with other methods.
2. There is not enough high-grade uranium ore to provide sufficient fuel. The use of low-grade ore will require either (a) as much, or more mining than coal for the equivalent amount of energy or (b) the deployment of a fast breeder reactor design worldwide. The latter is even MORE expensive than light water reactors and also requires highly enriched fuel that can be used for bombs.

J) I agree that Fission should die a well-deserved death, but my reasoning is different.

Fusion power is dead-on-arrival. It will never be practical because if will be even more expensive than fission. If we have learned anything from the past FORTY years of fusion research, it is that fusion is complicated, difficult, and therefore will be prohibitively expensive.
Now that these hopeless energy technologies have be put to a well-deserved rest, what WILL work?
There are EXACTLY FOUR energy sources that hold hope for the long-term future:
1. Harnessing of the ocean thermal gradient for production of electricity and energy-rich chemicals such as liquid fuels.
2. Conversion of biomass into liquid and gaseous fuels.
3. Wind turbines.
4. Photovoltaic arrays.

J) You did not include hydro electric generation.
There are many places where hydro electric generation might be developed. There are many small rivers that could generate few hundred kilowatts per hour. Each kilowatt would alleviate the demand from the large generation plants, also the energy that is wasted by AC generation when the demand is low, could be used to convert water into hydrogen and oxygen.
A unique idea occurred to me when I was looking at information about California. It seems that the lowest point in Death Valley is 282 feet below sea level, would it not be possible to run a pipe from the Pacific Ocean to Death Valley and install a generator just at the end of the 282 foot drop? Perhaps most of the exhaust water could also be evaporated and collected as clean water. The salt left behind would also be useful.
Who knows, the Death Valley Power Project might cure the California Power problems.

In addition, a few energy transport and storage technologies hold promise for moving energy through space and time.
1. Hydrogen.
2. High efficiency rechargeable batteries such as metal hydride and lithium.
3. DC electric power grids.
4. Flywheel storage.

J) Storage and transportation could also be in the form of metal hydrides. For instance Calcium hydride, it gives off a large quantity of hydrogen when mixed with water.

Having studied this for some three decades, I honestly haven't found anything other than those mentioned above. If I have left anything out, please let me know.

J) That’s my contribution to the energy ideas. Others may have more ideas.

Johannes