I think so too. Trouble is, people who are against renewables are insisting upon continued research only as a means of burying renewables altogether. They know as well as anyone that ANY new technology cannot compete cost-wise with a firmly entrenched, highly manufactured existing technology. The best way to drive the cost down is to actually take action and build the new tech. As larger manufacturing production runs are produced, the cost will nosedive. Actual use will also produce better information about improving the product than any small think-tank could produce. Manufacturing and product improvements will drive the cost down further, which trigger even larger production runs, and still the cost drops.
This is common knowledge to anyone who's bothered to pay attention to the process. The game that anti-renewable forces are playing is hoping that people know more about how reality TV shows work, than they do about basic economics. If anti-renewable forces can trick folks into thinking more research and better leadership is needed before doing anything (and thereby halting any manufacturing), they can insure the only cost we ever see for renewables is the prototype cost which is orders of magnitude higher than the full-blown production cost. In turn they can show off this deceptively high prototype cost, and claim more research is needed, because the new tech isn't cost competetive enough. Push it back into research and the next prototype will also be too expensive, and so on, and so on. It's a nice feedback loop that guarantees renewables will NEVER be used. This is their entire goal. The best part is they can claim they're supporting renewables with this dog and pony show, when they're actually completely against it. The game of anti-renewable pundits is ridiculously transparent when viewed with common sense.
