U.S. Will Give Cold Fusion Second Look, After 15 Years

NY Times ^ | March 25, 2004 | KENNETH CHANG

[neverdem]

Cold fusion, briefly hailed as the silver-bullet solution to the world's energy problems and since discarded to the same bin of quackery as paranormal phenomena and perpetual motion machines, will soon get a new hearing from Washington.

Despite being pushed to the fringes of physics, cold fusion has continued to be worked on by a small group of scientists, and they say their figures unambiguously verify the original report, that energy can be generated simply by running an electrical current through a jar of water.

Last fall, cold fusion scientists asked the Energy Department to take a second look at the process, and last week, the department agreed.

No public announcement was made. A British magazine, New Scientist, first reported the news this week, and Dr. James F. Decker, deputy director of the science office in the Energy Department, confirmed it in an e-mail interview.

"It was my personal judgment that their request for a review was reasonable," Dr. Decker said.

For advocates of cold fusion, the new review brings them to the cusp of vindication after years of dismissive ridicule.

"I am absolutely delighted that the D.O.E. is finally going to do the right thing," Dr. Eugene F. Mallove, editor of Infinite Energy magazine, said. "There can be no other conclusion than a major new window has opened on physics."

The research is too preliminary to determine whether cold fusion, even if real, will live up to its initial billing as a cheap, bountiful source of energy, said Dr. Peter Hagelstein, a professor of electrical engineering and computer science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who has been working on a theory to explain how the process works. Experiments have generated small amounts of energy, from a fraction of a watt to a few watts.

Still, Dr. Hagelstein added, "I definitely think it has potential for commercial energy production."

Dr. Decker said the scientists, not yet chosen, would probably spend a few days listening to presentations and then offer their thoughts individually. The review panel will not conduct experiments, he said.

"What's on the table is a fairly straightforward question, is there science here or not?" Dr. Hagelstein said. "Most fundamental to this is to get the taint associated with the field hopefully removed."

Fusion, the process that powers the Sun, combines hydrogen atoms, releasing energy as a byproduct. In March 1989, Drs. B. Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischmann, two chemists at the University of Utah, said they had generated fusion in a tabletop experiment using a jar of heavy water, where the water molecules contain a heavier version of hydrogen, deuterium, and two palladium electrodes. A current running through the electrodes pulled deuterium atoms into the electrodes, which somehow generated heat, the scientists said. Dr. Fleischmann speculated that the heat was coming from fusion of the deuterium atoms.

Other scientists trying to reproduce the seemingly simple experiment found the effects fickle and inconsistent. Because cold fusion, if real, cannot be explained by current theories, the inconsistent results convinced most scientists that it had not occurred. The signs of extra heat, critics said, were experimental mistakes or generated by the current or, perhaps, chemical reactions in the water, but not fusion.

Critics also pointed out that to produce the amount of heat reported, conventional fusion reactions would throw out lethal amounts of radiation, and they argued that the continued health of Drs. Pons and Fleischmann, as well as other experimenters, was proof that no fusion occurred.

Some cold fusion scientists now say they can produce as much as two to three times more energy than in the electric current. The results are also more reproducible, they say. They add that they have definitely seen fusion byproducts, particularly helium in quantities proportional to the heat generated.

After a conference in August, Dr. Hagelstein wrote to Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham, asking for a meeting. Dr. Hagelstein; Dr. Michael McKubre of SRI International in Menlo Park, Calif.; and Dr. David J. Nagel of George Washington University met Dr. Decker on Nov. 6.

"They presented some data and asked for a review of the scientific research that has been conducted," Dr. Decker said. "The scientists who came to see me are from excellent scientific institutions and have excellent credentials."

Scientists working on conventional fusion said cold fusion research had fallen off their radar screens.

"I'm surprised," Dr. Stewart C. Prager, a professor of physics at the University of Wisconsin, said. "I thought most of the cold fusion effort had phased out. I'm just not aware of any physics results that motivated this."

[neverdem]

Fairy tales can come true

They can happen to you

When you're so hard up

You're compelled to make do

[neverdem]

PING

[per loin]

Does this mean that the decree that was issued saying that cold fusion could not work may be repealed?

[Future Useless Eater]

With HYBRID cars getting 50-60 mpg, their batteries getting cheaper and cheaper (which will also help electric car sales), and FUEL CELLS coming online soon, the AY-RABS will be trying to sell their sand soon!

_________________________________________________________ (this year's winner of the Miserable Failure Award: Hillary Clinton) (Liberalism is a mental illness - a precursor disease to Terminal Socialism.)
_______ | |__| \____ | FLE \ -O-O-O-O-O-O-\\	Freedom_Loving_engineer

[nikola]

What a waste of money... no mater how much you debate it, a pig will never fly.

[kcvl]

The new sound of fusion
Business Standard, India - Mar 17, 2004

SNIP


“Cold fusion”, or tabletop fusion, is one subject on which the scientific community is violently divided.

Some scientists maintain that it is impossible; others say it’s possible and a chosen few have laid their reputations on the line by claiming to have achieved it.

One of those few is Rusi Talyarkhan, professor of nuclear engineering at Purdue University. In 2002, he led a team of Russo-American researchers who claimed success in a paper published in Science journal.

That initial result met with scepticism. But Talyarkhan’s team have done a more refined version of the experiment that, they claim, has reproduced and confirmed the results. The details will be published soon.

In 1989, a Franco-American combination of Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischman claimed to have achieved cold fusion at Utah University. Their results were discredited and, eventually, the two were even accused of deliberate fraud. It was a simple chemical reaction rather than nuclear fusion.

The Purdue team used a radically new method. First, they took a bowl of liquid acetone doped with a hydrogen isotope called deuterium, which has an extra neutron. This liquid was bombarded with fast-moving neutrons (electrically neutral particles). That created cavities, bubbles in lay terms. Then, the acetone was bombarded with ultrasound.

The bubbles trapped the ultrasound energy to go through a process of expansion and contraction, eventually, collapsing with great force. The energy released from the collapse raises the temperature, causing flashes of light.

The technique of sono-luminescence, or creating light through sound, is established and well-known and nobody’s disputing this effect.

But the Purdue team claims that fusion occurs and the deuterium changes to tritium (another isotope of hydrogen with more neutrons) with the release of gamma rays. Albeit confined to small spaces, sun-like conditions of temperature and pressure are created within the bubbles.

The techniques used will clarify many questions. It reduces the cost of creating neutrons by orders of magnitude. The high temperature-pressure gradients may be used to produce diamonds and other exotic materials. But did the experiments create fusion? The jury’s out.

[GeronL]

cold fusion will not work, until someone makes it work. Until then, its a fantasy. =o)

[DentsRun]

With HYBRID cars getting 50-60 mpg, their batteries getting cheaper and cheaper (which will also help electric car sales), and FUEL CELLS coming online soon, the AY-RABS will be trying to sell their sand soon!

I was talking to Alan Cicconi of AC Propulsion a couple of years ago. He's not sure that hybrid cars are at the present time such a big advantage over conventional cars. He says if you made a lightweight car with a small gasline engine, aerodynamic streamlining and high pressure tires you could easily match the mileage of the Japanese hybrids (which in truth don't get the mileage advertised anyway).

[The Radical Capitalist]

Where's that "Oh, no...not this sh*t again" guy when you need him?

[Kozak]

Can't wait till I can have one of these for home use....

[neverdem]

LOL

[Irishguy]

okay it might be wishful thinking...but i would like to see the next opec meeting once this is sorted!!!!

you can see the saudis telling their people 'hey you mob, yes you who have only read 1 book in your life, we are poor again...'

[Bogey78O]

http://www.lights.nildram.co.uk/not-this-again.jpg

[Bogey78O]

http://www.lights.nildram.co.uk/not-this-again.jpg

[DoughtyOne]

I am reminded that when early trains first achieved moderate speeds around 40 - 50 miles per hour, people were convinced it would be unhealthy for humans.

Folks, there's hardly been a discovery in human history that wasn't said impossible before it was proven a reality.

I'm not sure what compels people to trash efforts to find new discoveries, but it seems to be a whole force of nature all it's own.

I'm content to sit back and enjoy the show. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. Go for it!

[claudiustg]

---He's not sure that hybrid cars are at the present time such a big advantage over conventional cars. He says if you made a lightweight car with a small gasline engine, aerodynamic streamlining and high pressure tires you could easily match the mileage of the Japanese hybrids (which in truth don't get the mileage advertised anyway).---

My Honda Insight has been getting 61.3 mpg over the last two years. While it's true you might be able to get a straight gasoline powered car to turn out that kind of milage, driving it would not be pleasant. The hybrids manage to perform like normal cars, while getting outstanding mileage.

[quietolong]

The real inventor of TV Did this.

Go to Chapter 2: Fusion

Farnovision
http://www.farnovision.com/

Also

the Farnsworth Archives
http://philotfarnsworth.com/

[kingu]

Wow, I gotta admit, there's a big reason why one should never look for science in popular press; they leap all over the place because usually they have no idea what the heck they're talking about.

And one question that desperately needs to be asked; even assuming that everything was correct with cold fusion, would it be possible to recover even 60% of the energy required to gather all the materials used in the experiment?

I'm wishing that these guys actually prove themselves and provide a great energy source. But then again, if wishes were ponies, every lawn would be green.

[cyborg]

I had this very same issue in mind today when I saw a baby bottle!

[quietolong]

>>> AY-RABS will be trying to sell their sand soon! <<<


Not a chance!
Can you say Big Oil.