Posted on 08/31/2004 4:48:56 PM PDT by LibWhacker
U.S. Energy Department gives true believers a new hearing
Later this month, the U.S. Department of Energy will receive a report from a panel of experts on the prospects for cold fusion—the supposed generation of thermonuclear energy using tabletop apparatus. It's an extraordinary reversal of fortune: more than a few heads turned earlier this year when James Decker, the deputy director of the DOE's Office of Science, announced that he was initiating the review of cold fusion science. Back in November 1989, it had been the department's own investigation that determined the evidence behind cold fusion was unconvincing. Clearly, something important has changed to grab the department's attention now.
The cold fusion story began at a now infamous press conference in March 1989. Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischmann, both electrochemists working at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, announced that they had created fusion using a battery connected to palladium electrodes immersed in a bath of water in which the hydrogen was replaced with its isotope deuterium—so-called heavy water. With this claim came the idea that tabletop fusion could produce more or less unlimited, low-cost, clean energy.
In physicists' traditional view of fusion, forcing two deuterium nuclei close enough together to allow them to fuse usually requires temperatures of tens of millions of degrees Celsius. The claim that it could be done at room temperature with a couple of electrodes connected to a battery stretched credulity [see photo, "Too Good to Be True?"].
But while some scientists reported being able to reproduce the result sporadically, many others reported negative results, and cold fusion soon took on the stigma of junk science.
Today the mainstream view is that champions of cold fusion are little better than purveyors of snake oil and good luck charms. Critics say that the extravagant claims behind cold fusion need to be backed with exceptionally strong evidence, and that such evidence simply has not materialized. "To my knowledge, nothing has changed that makes cold fusion worth a second look," says Steven Koonin, a member of the panel that evaluated cold fusion for the DOE back in 1989, who is now chief scientist at BP, the London-based energy company.
Because of such attitudes, science has all but ignored the phenomenon for 15 years. But a small group of dedicated researchers have continued to investigate it. For them, the DOE's change of heart is a crucial step toward being accepted back into the scientific fold. Behind the scenes, scientists in many countries, but particularly in the United States, Japan, and Italy, have been working quietly for more than a decade to understand the science behind cold fusion. (Today they call it low-energy nuclear reactions, or sometimes chemically assisted nuclear reactions.) For them, the department's change of heart is simply a recognition of what they have said all along—whatever cold fusion may be, it needs explaining by the proper process of science.
THE FIRST HINT that the tide may be changing came in February 2002, when the U.S. Navy revealed that its researchers had been studying cold fusion on the quiet more or less continuously since the debacle began. Much of this work was carried out at the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center in San Diego, where the idea of generating energy from sea water—a good source of heavy water—may have seemed more captivating than at other laboratories.
Many researchers at the center had worked with Fleischmann, a well-respected electrochemist, and found it hard to believe that he was completely mistaken. What's more, the Navy encouraged a culture of risk-taking in research and made available small amounts of funding for researchers to pursue their own interests.
At San Diego and other research centers, scientists built up an impressive body of evidence that something strange happened when a current passed through palladium electrodes placed in heavy water.
And by 2002, a number of Navy scientists believed it was time to throw down the gauntlet. A two-volume report, entitled "Thermal and nuclear aspects of the Pd/D2O system," contained a remarkable plea for proper funding from Frank Gordon, the head of navigation and applied science at the Navy center. "It is time that this phenomenon be investigated so that we can reap whatever benefits accrue from scientific understanding. It is time for government funding agencies to invest in this research," he wrote. The report was noted by the DOE but appeared to have little impact.
Then, last August, in a small hotel near the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in Cambridge, some 150 engineers and scientists met for the Tenth International Conference on Cold Fusion. Conference observers were struck by the careful way in which various early criticisms of the research were being addressed. Over the years, a number of groups around the world have reproduced the original Pons-Fleischmann excess heat effect, yielding sometimes as much as 250 percent of the energy put in.
To be sure, excess energy by itself is not enough to establish that fusion is taking place. In addition to energy, critics are quick to emphasize, the fusion of deuterium nuclei should produce other byproducts, such as helium and the hydrogen isotope tritium. Evidence of these byproducts has been scant, though Antonella de Ninno and colleagues from the Italian National Agency for New Technologies Energy and the Environment, in Rome, have found strong evidence of helium generation when the palladium cells are producing excess heat but not otherwise.
Other researchers are finally beginning to explain why the Pons-Fleischmann effect has been difficult to reproduce. Mike McKubre from SRI International, in Menlo Park, Calif., a respected researcher who is influential among those pursuing cold fusion, says that the effect can be reliably seen only once the palladium electrodes are packed with deuterium at ratios of 100 percent—one deuterium atom for every palladium atom. His work shows that if the ratio drops by as little as 10 points, to 90 percent, only 2 experimental runs in 12 produce excess heat, while all runs at a ratio of 100 percent produce excess heat.
And scientists are beginning to get a better handle on exactly how the effect occurs. Stanislaw Szpak and colleagues from the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command have taken infrared video images of palladium electrodes as they produce excess energy. It turns out that the heat is not produced continuously over the entire electrode but only in hot spots that erupt and then die on the electrode surface. This team also has evidence of curious mini-explosions on the surface.
Fleischmann, who is still involved in cold fusion as an advisor to a number of groups, feels vindicated. He told the conference: "I believe that the work carried out thus far amply illustrates that there is a new and richly varied field of research waiting to be explored." (Pons is no longer involved in the field, having dropped from view after a laboratory he joined in southern France ceased operations.)
For Peter Hagelstein, an electrical engineer at MIT who works on the theory behind cold fusion and who chaired the August 2003 conference, the quality of the papers was hugely significant. "It's obvious that there are effects going on," he says. He and two colleagues believed the results were so strong that they were worth drawing to the attention of the DOE, and late last year they secured a meeting with the department's Decker.
It was a meeting that paid off dramatically. The review will give cold fusion researchers a chance—perhaps their last—to show their mettle. The department has yet to decide just what will be done and by whom. There is no guarantee of funding or of future support. But for a discipline whose name has become a byword for junk science, the DOE's review is a big opportunity.
If only they knew what was happening in my la-BOR-a-tory. MMMRRRUUUHAHAHAHAHA!
Dr. Randell Mills (Blacklight Power Inc.) doesn't need any stinking neutrons. He has Hydrinos!
Plain old fission is a sure thing. Wouldn't it be better to step it up? And also why do we neglect the research on hot fusion - downsize it in the US and stall it in ITER? Inquiring minds want to know?
"Professor Goddard ... does not know the relation of action to reaction ... he only
seems to lack the knowledge ladled out daily in our high schools"
[New York Times, January 13, 1920]
"Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible."
[Lord Kelvin, president, Royal Society, 1895]
"Airplanes are interesting toys but of no military value."
[Marechal Ferdinand Foch, Professor of Strategy, Ecole Superieure de Guerre]
There are TWO problems with your probative analysis.
First, the HUP is (when ignoring the delta-p delta-x form)
delta E * delta t ~ h/(2*pi)
That is, they are uncertainties of the value and not absolute value.
Please note that you switch the two in your 1st through 3rd equations.
Second, in cold fusion there are substantial fugacities
attained using locally large electric field intensities
and the impact of the loaded lattice
which your equations 4 (and others) ignore.
On the other hand, the negativists have
much company in being unable to perceive humanities' creativity.
"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home."
[Ken Olson, Chairman and founder Digital Equipment Corp., 1977]
"640K ought to be enough for anybody."
[Bill Gates, 1981]
Yippeee!!!! And about time.
WOW that is some response. Let's go back to my original question.
Now I again ask where was your PHD work done in Chemical Physics?
You sound like the collegues of Watson, Crick and Franklin in the late 50's when they had discovered something interesting about little protiens.
I would also assume such a learned man as yourself would know that the following statement
" So you're saying that since research is being done by everyone from charlatans like Pons"
Is liable and quite actionable. But I suppose your expertise in the law overshadows your expertise in Chemical physics.
"Is that why Pons and co. were run out of town on a rail all those years ago, to linger in the shadows of crank research desperate to prove to the cult that surrounds them, that yes, the truth is out there?"
Hmm so how does the above statement jibe with ....?
"Over the years, a number of groups around the world have reproduced the original Pons-Fleischmann excess heat effect, yielding sometimes as much as 250 percent of the energy put in."
So if I may clarify your position.... These number of other Labrotories around the world are doing "crank research" when they are able to replicate and even exceed the original findings of Pons and Fleischer? How does one do that effectively? I mean reproduce Apparently" fake" Chemical Reactions? Looking forward to that insight from you.
I have further questions about the following also...
"As the gentleman that posted just above very succinctly put it: if it's real, show me the neutrons. As no one has yet to do this, despite what you claim to be fifteen years of rigorous research with nothing to show for it, I'll stand by me reading of the evidence which, regardless of what you may say or think (if you can call it that), has proved fruitless, dead end after deader end."
Why do they have to show YOU the neutrons? I didn't know you might be the arbiter of all scientific knowledge, However I don't keep up on such things as I should. So I do apologize for not recognizing your title.
Furthermore, here is a question.... If this is an act of a charlaton, a con man, a ruse, what would drive people to stake their professional reputations, millions of dollars in research to a process that would as you put it be a dead end? I have seen obsesive compulsive disorders that would cause people to do the same thing over and over when they did not work, But how do you explain 150 scientists from all over the world doing the apparently same failed experiment over and over? Wouldnt you think they would have better use of their time?..... Or might there be a spark in there that they find their, time, money and intellect, worth every moment of time trying to figure out what is happening in this process? Just curious.
Oh yeah and this....
"I'll stand by me reading of the evidence which, regardless of what you may say or think (if you can call it that), has proved fruitless, dead end after deader end.
If you were standing on the beach of kittyhawk north carolina at the turn of the last century and saw a couple of brothers carrying the remains of their broken glider.....what would you have said to them? Keep going you will succeed! or Something like this.... Men weren't made to fly! I'll stand by me reading of the evidence which, regardless of what you may say or think (if you can call it that) Orville Wright your experiment , has proved fruitless, dead end after deader end. Silly flights of fancy those bicycle brothers....
Oh yeah and this gem....
"Till then, I leave you and your cohorts to your flights of fancy, where Big Foot, ET and the perpetual motion machine are all being waylaid by evil sheiks, menacing oil companies and the Illuminati.
Me and my cohorts? Hmmm don't remember having any cohorts. All I did was to ask what your credintials were to make such definitive statements of obvious failure.
I Don't know if cold fusion Or what ever they are observing will lead anywhere, however I am willing for them to try.
Let's play the "what if" game? What if they find a way of converting this process into usable electrical energy? How would that change the world? And if it did would you be bitter about it because you were wrong?
Just curious.
Not to be confused with CFML
That is a good observation. Years ago Bell Labs investigated all emergeing technologies because they could. Remember what it cost to make a long distance phone call? The profit from this regulated and monopolistic enterprise gave us many technologies which we use today. Not the least of which are reliable semiconductors, UNIX s/w, and fiber optic telecommunications cable. Without the later technology we would not be doing this right now because the bandwidth would not exist and if we could, the cost would be prohibitive.
BTW, does anybody reading this know of Gene Mallove? He was killed by an alleged prowler at his parents home in NJ. He lived in NH and was an advocate for cold fusion. I do not believe it was an accident. The reason I say this is that he published a magazine devoted to cold fusion and he organized the international convention on cold fusion. His actions kept the idea of cold fusion current. He exposed frauds and reported on potential success stories. If anyone wanted to squelch cold fusion they might start with him. Does anybody believe it indeed was an accident as the official report states that the prowler must have been startled and killed him but they never caught the killer. I guess it was just an accident, not.
To my way of thinking, it's a probability problem, pure and simple: Which lines of research are most likely to lead to important advancements? And for that you have to rely on the "scientific establishment" to help you decide. Unfortunately or not, everyone else gets short changed.
////////////////////
the presumption here is that current high energy fusion research is likely to lead to important advancements.
But scratch any high energy fusion researchers and they'll all ssay they at least 20 years off from anything.
on that face of it that looks like slim probabilities for the "respectable" line of research. also that's a lot of dog years in advace for the possibility of something.
so I see no harm in the feds keeping their options open.
I'm all for cold fusion research. The U.S. is the most technologically innovative country and there should be more money going to alternative energy research. Anything to reduce oil dependence sounds good to me.
If the Navy is indeed working on it ... wow.
IIRC, you laid this out rather succinctly last time.
I'll stick with ASP.NET...no wait...wrong Cold Fusion...nevermind.
The fact that it does produce more energy has been well documented. The exact physics involved it still open for debate.
Beware of fads like "global warming" and only focus upon the factual information. For some strange reason, the current fad is that cold fusion was a classic example of false science.
I will continue to keep an open mind on the subject and evaluate all factual information submitted on this topic.
Facts are facts. I hope that factual information never gets killed.
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