  The accumulated knowledge and the prospects for commercial energy production
from fission breeder and fusion reactors are analyzed in this report.
  The publicly available data from past experimental breeder reactors indicate
that a large number of unsolved technological problems exist and that the
amount of "created" fissile material, either from the U238 --> Pu239 or from
the Th232 --> U233 cycle, is still far below the breeder requirements and
optimistic theoretical expectations. Thus huge efforts, including many basic
research questions with an uncertain outcome, are needed before a large
commercial breeder prototype can be designed. Even if such efforts are
undertaken by the technologically most advanced countries, it will take several
decades before such a prototype can be constructed. We conclude therefore, that
ideas about near-future commercial fission breeder reactors are nothing but
wishful thinking.
  We further conclude that, no matter how far into the future we may look,
nuclear fusion as an energy source is even less probable than large-scale
breeder reactors, for the accumulated knowledge on this subject is already
sufficient to say that commercial fusion power will never become a reality.
