I'm over coal. I don't believe that coal emissions will ever be cleaned up. Coal ash disposal is a huge ecological disaster that will haunt this planet's occupants forever. Mountain-top removal is another ecological disaster that must be stopped. Coal mines need to be monitored constantly by regulatory agencies or the mine owners will skirt safety regulations and miners will continue to die. But the bottom line, as far as coal is concerned, is that there is no such thing as clean coal. Cheap electricity from coal today will be paid for by generations to come and it will be expensive beyond our comprehension.
I'm not terribly enamored with wind energy either. While I think that wind farms are nice supplemental energy sources, wind is just not reliable. Ask any sailor about the doldrums.
But nuclear fusion! Now there is a clean, reliable source of energy with a plethora of benefits that will go on for millennia.
To start with, nuclear fusion has zero infrastructure costs for virtually unlimited electrical generation. It is highly reliable. Its "down time" and "up time" can be predicted daily to the second.
Nuclear fusion does not require any expensive infrastructure upgrades or capital costs. The power is transmitted through the air and each user can "receive" the power by installing nuclear fusion receivers, which, when costs are pro-rated, will continue to receive power absolutely free for decades beyond their payoff point, or return on investment. This thought drives power plant owners crazy!
Nuclear fusion receiver array on roof.
Nuclear fusion is almost completely impervious to natural disasters. It is also very resilient in the face of war and terrorism since the generation plant cannot be affected by human intervention and because the receiver units are widely dispersed. If a building utilizing nuclear fusion for power is destroyed, only the power to that building is affected and surrounding buildings that are not damaged will continue to have their electrical power unaffected.
There are no waste problems with nuclear fusion. There are no costs for exploring for, mining, transporting, and refining fuel for nuclear fusion. It is absolutely clean. The receivers have no moving parts, so other than occasional cleaning in dusty areas, they require no maintenance whatsoever.
Now, don't get me wrong. Nothing is perfect. Humans exposed to nuclear fusion can contract cancer as a result. There are several remedies for this hazard and primary among those remedies are shade and sunscreen. In fact, and I love this remedy, the nuclear fusion receivers actually make great sources of shade! How beautiful is that? But beware! Opponents of nuclear fusion are vicious and can be very seductive.
Opponent of nuclear fusion
Also, there is definite scheduled "down time" daily where the nuclear receivers won't be receiving power because of interference to the line-of-sight between the receivers and the nuclear fusion power transmitter. This line-of-sight glitch cannot be overcome except for seasonal situations in some geographical areas. Because of this glitch, other sources of power will still be needed as we convert to and fully utilize nuclear fusion. Presently, electricity generated during nuclear fusion "up times" can be stored in a variety of ways and used during the "down times", but the most trouble-free and easiest way for most users to get through the "down time" will be by using other alternative electric sources via the present grid at those regularly scheduled outages. But once again, the beauty of this is that those "down times" coincide largely when demands on the electric grid are at their minimums, so coal plants can be phased out successfully as wind and other sources, such as natural gas, bridge the gap until electrical storage becomes more cheap and practical.
Things I'm not in favor of: Nuclear fission, nukular power, vampires sucking the life out of our planet.