The Peak Oil Crisis: Transitioning to Cold Fusion

Falls Church News Press ^ | Nov 16 2011 | Tom Whipple

[Kevmo]

The Peak Oil Crisis: Transitioning to Cold Fusion By Tom Whipple
Wednesday, November 16 2011 02:45:44 PM

Events move quickly these days. Two weeks ago we were watching Bologna, Italy where an entrepreneur and a retired physics professor claimed to have discovered the Holy Grail of energy - cold fusion or as it is now known: Low Energy Nuclear Reactions. At the time, there was (and still is) widespread concern that the various demonstrations of an energy-producing devices were a scam as the developers, for commercial reasons, refused to give outsiders access to their inner workings .

If you are coming late to this story, the Italians' "energy catalyzer" is a table-top-sized device containing powdered nickel known as the "reactor." When hydrogen is introduced into the container and heat is applied, the device gets hotter and hotter so that the output of heat exceeds the input by so much that no known chemical reaction can be responsible for generating the heart. This leads to the conclusion that the hydrogen is fusing with the nickel producing energy similar to that coming from the sun or from the detonation of a hydrogen bomb .

Now so much energy coming from such a small and inexpensive device, in violation of what are thought to be the principles of physics, seems too good to be true. As this phenomenon had not been independently repeated and verified by other laboratories, many pronounced it a fraud, a few the greatest breakthrough of the age, and the rest of us remained agnostic while awaiting further developments .

They were not long in coming. Last week it was learned that George Miley, a Professor Emeritus of nuclear engineering at the University of Illinois who has been conducting experiments similar to those in Italy for many years, has been observing anomalous amounts of heat emanating from test equipment similar to that being used in Bologna. Miley has been experimenting with palladium-zirconium alloys, but says his experiments are producing so much heat that could only be coming from fusion of atomic nuclei. Unlike the Italian experiments which are aimed at developing a proprietary commercial product, the Illinois experiments are being conducting under the auspices of a state university with details of the experiments being made known as soon as possible. At a university the aim of scientific research is to win a Nobel Prize, or at least academic prestige, not to make money .

While a second report does not adequately confirm that heat-producing, low-energy nuclear reactions are a real phenomenon, it is does seem to reduce the likelihood of fraud on the part of a single man or organization. Furthermore it increases the possibility that we could be witnessing the early stages of what could be one of the greatest scientific discoveries in human history - production of unlimited amounts of cheap, pollution-free energy .

We could be witnessing the early stages of one of the greatest scientific discoveries in human history .

Let's suspend our disbelief for a few moments that anything too-good-to-be-true ever happens anymore, and pretend that these reports really do portend the age of low energy nuclear fusion; that within decades energy shortages will be a thing of the past; and every person on earth could, and I say could advisedly, be blessed with unlimited amounts of cheap energy .

The problem for now, of course, is getting from here to there. Most of you likely have noticed that the world is beset with an abnormal amount of trouble at the minute - the EU financial system is coming unstuck; many think that the fabled "double-dip" recession (depression?) is only weeks away; governance of the US is in near gridlock; global warming's droughts and floods have many hungry, dying of thirst, or standing in water up to their armpits; world oil production is on course to starting dropping within the next few years; and there are now seven billion of us running around with the UN projecting we could number 15 billion by the end of the century .

For now all we have are some promising laboratory experiments and a handful of prototypes. It is starting to look as if there could be many ways of making heat by getting hydrogen to fuse with metal at low temperatures. Sorting out which method would be best, even one to get started with, is likely to take some time. Then somebody needs to tell the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that we would like to install some 100 million or so nuclear reactors, albeit small ones, in our buildings .

Then there are the rice bowls that would have to be broken. Somebody will have to tell OPEC, Exxon, the power companies, coal mines, and gas well frackers that we won't be needing their services anymore and that they should get into some other line of work. This, of course, raises the possibility that the Congress, under pressure from lobbyists, chambers, and unemployed constituents, outlaws fusion reactors under one pretext or another - no matter how well and cheaply they might work. The point of all this is to say that there could be considerable resistance to the advent of cheap, clean energy that will inevitably upset many apple carts even if it promises to save mankind from extinction by an ever-warming climate .

There is another side of this story however. Much of the world is desperate (or soon will be) for affordable energy. Japan and the EU have little or no indigenous supplies of fossil fuels remaining and are backing away from conventional nuclear power as too dangerous. Even the Chinese are catching on that too much carbon in the air can be hazardous to your economic well-being. Europe, Japan, Korea, India, and China are not incompetent in technological matters. Nor are they as susceptible to pressures from the old order seeking to preserve its ways of making money .

If the current experiments are repeatable and the technology is viable, cold fusion is likely to go viral very quickly with thousands of laboratories and corporations around the world rushing for a piece of the next Internet. The next year or so could tell us a lot about the course of civilization in coming decades .


________________________________________
Tom Whipple is a retired government analyst and has been following the peak oil issue for several years.

[backwoods-engineer]

Here's a simpler explanation of the reaction, showing how 5 grams of transmuted nickel could generate 10 kW of thermal heat for 6 months, assuming 50% efficiency transforming the nuclear energy to heat:

http://www.journal-of-nuclear-physics.com/?p=473

[Lx]

It's impressive because the ecat has only operated for a few hours. It might be deposits, too. And when the guy comes out to replace Rossi's homemade isotopes every six months, what is he going to see? And is he going to have to scrape off the putty every time and replace it?

As much as I think this is a scam, I don't think that is a winning argument. He is working with prototypes; when it comes time to make the production ones. I'm sure things will change, not that I'll ever think he's going to get to that point.

As for the goo he's using as a gasket, I'm sure the production device will use a robust gasket that can take the temperature, pressure and whatever toxic brew (if there is any) inside. Diesel engine head gaskets take an incredible amount of abuse, I'm not worried about the replace ability of the Ecat materiel, if he's smart, he'll have it in cartridge form for them to make the swap easy and economical.

We should have a rating system for our posts that is at the bottom of the post. Something like:

SCAM.= S

REAL.= R

UNDECIDED.- Un

Or maybe at the top so people that don't want to, don't have to wade through posts that might give them the vapors.

[Greysard]

And when the guy comes out to replace Rossi's homemade isotopes every six months, what is he going to see?

It doesn't actually matter what the technician sees. All that matter is what you see and get out of this machine. If some heat exchangers corrode too much then I guess Rossi would have to replace them under warranty.

And is he going to have to scrape off the putty every time and replace it?

There are all kinds of gaskets in the world. A putty is something you use in a prototype because it requires no custom manufacturing and no grooves in joined parts, and it works with any compression (as long as the putty is not pushed out of the gap.) However if the device is designed for opening and closing then other gaskets may be more suitable. For example, your electric water heater (if you have one) has a screw-in heating element or two. These are sealed in the opening with a solid gasket. I don't remember what that was in my heater, but they can be made from various materials, from rubber to plastic to lead. The catch is that the gasket of this type requires a lot of pressure to be fully compressed, and that calls for a great number of screws. Clearly that's inconvenient in a prototype. But solid gaskets are used everywhere.

One example of semi-liquid gasket is the thermal grease that is applied to semiconductor parts before they are mounted onto a heatsink. This grease is poisonous (if it is Beryllium-based) and excellent at smearing on anything that you'd rather keep clean, and it has to be washed off with solvent and replaced when you reassemble parts. There are now solid thermal gaskets too, but the grease is just too convenient, and it is extremely cheap (1% of the price of a solid thermal interface.)

[dalereed]

Peak oil os bullshit!!!!
We have at least 1000 years of oil here in the US!

[Moonman62]

The putty isn’t the main problem. It’s all the deposits and corrosion that will be a problem. That ecat has only operated for a few hours.

[Johnny B.]

You said:

Uh, wrong. There is very little correspondence between what Rossi purports to be doing and uranium isotope enrichment.

You're confused.

The quote (HERE) has nothing to do with the process within the E-Cat. It refers to what Rossi claims to do to the Nickel fuel before he puts it in the E-Cat. He says:

We buy regular Ni powder, then we make a treatment of it wich changes the isotopical composition.

Changing the "isotopic composition" is exactly the same process used to enrich, for example, Uranium. Rossi claims to be able to do this in a small, non-industrial basis, for pennies a gram, and in kilogram quantities. That would be enormously more valuable a process than the E-Cat.

Also note that the analysis HERE states that there were no changes from the natural isotope ratios in either the Nickel or the Copper.  This contradicts Rossi's statement about "enhancing" specific isotopes (unless, by "enhance" he means "draw little smiley faces on each atom").

You said:

Here's a simpler explanation of the reaction, showing how 5 grams of transmuted nickel could generate 10 kW of thermal heat for 6 months, assuming 50% efficiency transforming the nuclear energy to heat:

http://www.journal-of-nuclear-physics.com/?p=473

Actually, that article contradicts Rossi's sample, as well. It posits that ⁵⁸Ni (natural occurrence 68%) is being converted into ⁶³Cu (natural occurrence 69%).  Rossi claimed (and provided a physical sample supposedly showing) that 30% of the Nickel had been transmuted into Copper within the E-Cat. If you assume that Bettini's paper is correct (and it is from Rossi's fake Journal, so Rossi must be endorsing it) then the resulting "ash" should have a seriously depeleted level of ⁵⁸Ni, and have a significant excess of ⁶³Cu.  But, again, the analysis showed only the natural ratios of isotopes for both elements.

Rossi's samples of both the unburned "fuel" and the "ash" directly contradict his claims to be "enhancing" the isotope ratio fuel as well as his claim to be transmuting the Nickel into Copper.  It also contradicts Bettini's conclusions.

Why doesn't Rossi's samples show any sort of non-natural isotope ratio?  Or any other indications of any sort of nuclear process occuring?  Because he couldn't fake that part of it.  I suspect that buying enriched isotopes of Nickel and Copper would be too expensive for a scam, as well as leaving open the possibility of Rossi being caught buying specific isotopes in order to "salt" his samples.

In contrast, Miley (LINK) has found 39 different non-natural isotope ratios in the "ash" of his LENR process.  That's impressive evidence of a nuclear process occurring.   Rossi doesn't have anything comparable.  All he has is natural Nickel and Copper, something he could have bought in a kid's chemistry set. 

[BallandPowder]

Powder..patch..ball FIRE!

The putty isn’t the main problem. It’s all the deposits and corrosion that will be a problem. That ecat has only operated for a few hours.

How do you know what is a problem with the technology or not?
Oh thats right. YOU DON'T.

[Lx]

[s]
Yes but in Rossi’s favor, I’m sure he can get an alloy that resists whatever corrosion is present. Nuke plants operate for years and I believe the actual reactor vessel is made of stainless steel. If I’m wrong, I’m sure someone will correct me.

[BallandPowder]

Whats a matter buddy? Weren’t you listening?
To: Moonman62
Powder..patch..ball FIRE!
It’s impressive because the ecat has only operated for a few hours. It might be deposits, too. And when the guy comes out to replace Rossi’s homemade isotopes every six months, what is he going to see? And is he going to have to scrape off the putty every time and replace it

IT IS A TEST PROTOTYPE. You are making specious comments to hide your ignorance or perhaps your belligerence.

If you were paying attention instead of just attempting to discredit, earlier articles on the subject stated that the units would be sealed

And if scraping putty is all I need to do to keep a fusion heater in my house for water and warmth I’d do it in a heartbeat.

39 posted on Thursday, November 17, 2011 9:30:31 AM by BallandPowder
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 36 | View Replies | Report Abuse]

---

[Moonman62]

Is Rossi still putting a self destruct device in the ecat?

[BallandPowder]

Powder..patch..ball FIRE!

Still grasping at straws.

[ichabod1]

Yeah, it would remove the reason for a hell of a lot of conflicts in the world, and send the ay-rabs back to the sandfleabitten bedouin lifestyle they so desperately seek to enforce on the rest of the world. And we could send theblue-eyed slave to tell that Saudi King that he can go “F” himself. Eat the oil.

(course we still use oil for almost everything we make these days, not to mention lubricants that will be very important in electric victors. )

[TheOldLady]

Click the Pic               Thank you, JoeProBono

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[Moonman62]

Is Rossi still claiming that the fusion of nickel and hydrogen is exothermic?

[SunkenCiv]

There’s no peak oil crisis, there’s an Obama-in-the-White-House crisis.

[Kevmo]

Rossi seems to be consistently picking partners with histories of gullibility and/or fraud.

***then explain Levi. Explain the Swedish Skeptics society. Explain focardi, and Josephson.

[Kevmo]

So, Kevmo, have you ordered your E-Cat yet?
***I wish I could. But I can’t afford one. It would be worthwhile even if it were to prove Rossi’s a fraud.

[Kevmo]

ignores the counter arguments.
***What I have found is that the hyperventilating skeptics are the ones who ignore the counter arguments.

[Kevmo]

Well said, other than this point:

or he has something going on out of sight.
***
That’s an argument from silence, invalid.

[Johnny B.]

***then explain Levi. Explain the Swedish Skeptics society. Explain focardi, and Josephson.

Here's the guy who invented the perpetual motion machine that is being "sold" by the same company that is now "selling" Rossi's gadget: Leslie_Szabó. HERE is another company "selling" his perpetual motion machine. In the "Certification Tests" page, they have signed affidavits from:

• Prof. Dr. R.K.Varms (University of Western Ontario at Longdon)
• Bruno Ciccotelli (V.P. Engineering & Operations, Norfolk Power
• Prof. Dr. Laszlo Szemtirmai (Miskoic University)
• Prof. Dr. Ferenc Madai (Miskoic University)
• Prof. Dr. Erno Petz (Budapest University)
• Prof. Dr. Bela Tolvaj (Miskoic University)
• Dr. Tibor Kiss, Ph.D. (Consultant in Physics)

stating that his perpetual motion machine really, really works!

It's clear that scammers find it as easy to get academics to fall for their scams about as easy as they find it to get gullible investors and customers.

Explain why I should believe Rossi's professors, but not these professors.