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PowerPedia:Cold fusion

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See also Directory:Cold Fusion

Cold fusion is a name for any nuclear fusion reaction which occurs significantly below the temperature required for standard thermonuclear reactions.

Also known as Low Energy Nuclear Reactions (LENR).

These reactions are not over unity. There is a fuel giving away energy. Hydrogen is collapsing to form Helium.

Table of contents
1 Cold Fusion's history

1.1 Beginnings
1.2 After 1989 to 2004
1.3 Continuing debate

2 Understanding the cold fusion reaction
3 Ongoing developments
4 Pathway problems
5 Additional notes
6 External articles
7 See also
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Cold Fusion's history

External encyclopedia article: Wikipedia's Cold Fusion
This is an outstanding encyclopedic article on Cold Fusion. There is more to the cold fusion story than this synopsis covers. See the Wikipedia Cold Fusion article for more details and links to useful and information cold fusion related websites.

They featured a synopsis of the entry on their home page Aug. 23, 2004.

Cold Fusion is perhaps the most controversial scientific claim of the 20th Century (and there was no shortage of controversial scientific claims during this time period).

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Beginnings

The controversy started from day one of the March, 23 1989 announcement. The two respected scientists, Dr. Stanley Pons and Dr. Martin Fleischmann, of the University of Utah, started off on the wrong foot when they announced their discovery via press conference, instead of via refereed scientific journals as is traditionally done (although their paper had been accepted to the Journal of Electroanalytical Chemistry just days prior to the press conference). Pons and Fleischmann were more or less forced by their employer, The University of Utah, to come forward and make their announcement in a hasty manner, in order to ensure the University had a jump on the competition for patent rights to their discovery.

The claims of fusion at room temperature with a simple apparatus were just too outlandish to be believed by many mainstream scientists, who saw the reported discovery as going against decades of nuclear research and theory. Their response was not surprising, considering the billions that had been spent on hot fusion research, and the fact that some of the expected nuclear fusion effects, such as deadly gamma rays were not reported.

The controversy continued to degenerate as claims of neutron emissions were quickly retracted by Pons and Fleischmann, and claims of replication from other laboratories started to wither under examination. Within weeks of the announcement, cold fusion had been tossed off into the trash bin of pseudo-science. Many were calling Pons and Fleischmann frauds. By the late Spring of 1989 it seemed that cold fusion had died a quick death.

However, a cold fusion underground of dedicated researchers continued to investigate the Pons and Fleischmann claims well after cold fusion was considered dead and forgotten by mainstream science. These underground researchers worked with little money and often in secrecy, as the subject remained highly controversial, and still is in many quarters today.

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After 1989 to 2004

Between 1989 and 2004 hundreds of reports of excess heat and nuclear ash were reported in a wide variety of scientific and sometimes quasi-scientific journals. These reports came from countries all around the world. Some even ventured into the realm of claims of transmutation of elements during the cold fusion reactions; a venture into another highly controversial scientific subject.

The important thing about the reported positive cold fusion results was that they were not coming from crackpot scientists. They were actually coming from reputable sources such as the U.S. Navy (who released a report in the Spring of 2002 that detailed ten years of cold fusion research), major oil companies, research centers such as SRI in California, and university and corporate scientists from around the world. Many of the reported positive results were quietly reported and ignored by mainstream science.

By 2004, the cold fusion controversy had thawed to the point that the U.S. Department of Energy was willing to re-examine cold fusion claims, after 15 years of ignoring them, and concluded their reassessment with a report (http://freeenergynews.com/Directory/ColdFusion/DOE_Report_2004/) in late 2004. Although not an endorsement of cold fusion, the report was more positive towards funding specific cold fusion research, and about one third of the reviewers indicated that they believed sufficient evidence for excess heat and nuclear ashes had been provided by the cold fusion proponents. This was a rather significant departure from the past taboo status that tarred cold fusion. One third of randomly selected scientists from American academia were now on record stating that sufficient evidence for cold fusion was available in the research papers published to date.

2004 was also a banner year for cold fusion press coverage, as mainstream science journals such as Nature and Science gave cold fusion a second look and cold fusion stories appeared in major publications such as the New York Times and Scientific American.

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Continuing debate

As of March 2006, the cold fusion controversy still remains to be settled. However, the tenor of the debate has seen a significant shift. Once lambasted as pseudo-science, taboo-science, the prime example of scientific fraud, and generally ignored by mainstream science, cold fusion has been slowly gaining respectability in the early 21st Century. Some commercialization efforts have even begun, as further outlined below.

It will probably take a major confirmation from another country, such as Italy, China or Japan to put the cold fusion controversy to rest. Other countries are much more open to cold fusion than the United States. Patents are routinely issued for cold fusion in Asia and Europe (whereas the U.S. Patent Office won't even consider cold fusion patents, as it is still considered taboo science).

Even if cold fusion is eventually proven beyond a doubt to mainstream science (there have been other controversial scientific ideas that took far longer to be resolved), there still are real questions about whether cold fusion will ever be anything more than just a laboratory curiosity. Something worth studying for pure science research reasons, but of little real importance to energy or other technological advancements.

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Understanding the cold fusion reaction

Years after the original cold fusion announcement, thousands of experiments have been performed and some preliminary conclusions have been drawn about the exact materials, ratios and conditions that are necessary to achieve cold fusion in a typical aqueous experimental setup. The optimal operating conditions at this moment are believed to be (PLEASE FILL IN AND ADD INFORMATION BELOW IF YOU CAN CONTIBUTE):


  • Cathode - Palladium with % purity
  • Anode - Platinum with % purity
  • Deuterium Oxide/Heavy Water - % Deuterium Oxide
  • Loading Time - <minimum time the Deuterium should be allowed to sit in cell prior to starting the experiment>
  • Running Time - <minimum time the cell should be operated before expecting any initial excess heat results>
  • Specific Material Batches - Succesful replication of the cold fusion reaction appears to be stongly affected by the batch of metal used for the cathode metal. Certain batches of palladium produce the cold fusion reaction more consistently, while others do not work at all. Why, is still not thoroughly understood, but appears to be related to the atomic structure of the metal sample and the amount of impurities within the metal sample.
  • Special Preparations - Many researchers have reported that performing specific preparations on the metals used in the cells prior to commencing an experiment will increase the chances of a positive cold fusion result. For example, some have suggested shaving 20% of the surface of the cathode or anode has been shown to increase the chances of a positive result.
  • Note: The understanding regarding which materials, ratios and conditions are is necessary to achieve a positive cold fusion result is subject to change over time as more research is conducted and data is collected and analyzed. There are still many variables and conditions associated with the cold fusion reaction that have not been fully explored and are currently not well understood.
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Ongoing developments

There are currently four known commercial development efforts underway to commercialize cold fusion as an energy source:

  1. Established: Energetics Technologies of Israel is actively pursuing commercialization of cold fusion research that originated in Russia. They are trying to enhance the cold fusion reaction by utilizing a concept known as the "superwave effect", which theoretically can increase the cold fusion reaction to a level at which it can be used in a commercial energy device. Unfortunately, little is known about the inner workings of this company. Their research developments are only sporadically revealed at international science conferences dedicated to this field. No Known Company Website. Two worthwhile write ups about Energetics can be found at: An Israeli Connection (http://blake.montclair.edu/~kowalskil/cf/204israel.html) and More about Energetics Technologies (http://blake.montclair.edu/~kowalskil/cf/213israel.html)
  2. Established: A company called D2Fusion of California is purportedly developing a solid state variant of the cold fusion reaction. D2Fusion was acquired by Solar Energy Limited of Vancouver, Canada in 2005. In their press release concerning their post-buyout plans Solar Energy Limited states, "The immediate target of D2Fusion is to produce a 1kW thermal module with parallel prototypes tested at Los Alamos and in Frascati, Italy. D2Fusion's ultimate goal is to produce electricity at less than 2 cents/kWh and heat at a fraction of today's cost, both achieved with no emissions." On March 23, 2006 D2Fusion announced that Martin Fleishmann had joined their cold fusion product development effort as an advisor, with a goal of a cold fusion home heater by Summer 2007. Cold fusion investigator Krivit is very skeptical about this company, see story in New Energy Times A Close Look at Russ George's D2Fusion Inc. (http://newenergytimes.com/news/2006/NET16.htm#d21) Website: D2Fusion (http://www.d2fusion.com/)
  3. Established: JET Thermal Products of Wellesley Hills, Massachusetts has been actively researching and pursuing commercialization of cold fusion since the early 1990s. They have focused their efforts on producing better performance, improved understanding and control of the physics, better and more diverse materials, advanced engineering, and quality assurance and quality control in cold fusion heat producing reactions and devices. In May 2005 JET announced that they are now producing cold fusion devices that produce work as well as excess heat. Website: JET Thermal Products (http://world.std.com/~mica/jet.html)
  4. Inactive: A commercialization effort has been rumored to be in process at an American/Canadian company known as iESi iESiUSA appears to have shut down and iESi, based in Canada has taken its place. They were attempting to commercialize a proprietary cold fusion cell, based on a South Korean patent, for utility scale energy delivery. However, the holder of the patent, a South Korean native, has disassociated himself with iESiUSA, Inc. and it appears that their efforts to develop cold fusion commercial products is no longer active. Additionally, iESi has offered no new updates since their original announcements in the first half of 2005. The South Korean patent holder is apparently pursuing other avenues to commercialize his cold fusion process. Indepth investigation by cold fusion reporter Krivit at New Energy Times Report on Innovative Energy Solutions Inc. (http://newenergytimes.com/news/2006/NET15.htm#iesi) Website: iESica (http://www.iesica.com/)

Other cold fusion related development efforts worth mentioning are:

  1. Established: Mitsubishi Industries of Japan has been researching cold fusion related technologies since the mid-late 1990s with varied success. Some of their researchers have reported transmutation of elements in their cold fusion cells. It is unclear if Mitsubishi's research efforts will lead to commercial developments of cold fusion technolgies, but since Mitsubishi is a for-profit business, it is reasonable to assume that they will commercialize any future cold fusion technology or product that is marketable.
  2. Established: The Mastrrr Company of Texas has been conducting research since 1991 which may relate to and benefit from published reports by scientists' ongoing advances in cold fusion research. Their research focuses on the vortex phenomenon, a phenomenon in which water cavitations occur in a vigorous tornado-like water formation, which apparently causes some sort of low energy nuclear reaction (LENR) which in turn causes transmutation of pollutants into inert materials. They are focusing their efforts on using this innovative cold fusion/LENR approach to desalinate water inexpensively and to treat contaminated groundwater and industrial waste water in an economical way that drastically reduces pollution prior to final treatment. They are currently moving towards field testing their technology. This is certainly an unexpected and innovative use of the cold fusion/LENR reaction. This could be a major development for parts of the world that struggle to provide clean water at a reasonable cost. Mastrrr Company is a privately owned, for profit, entity of the forty year old Macaulay group in Texas. Many firms such as Mastrrr are engaged in applied research in fields other than cold fusion. These firms are beginning to benefit from basic cold fusion research as the worldwide results are published. Company Website: The Mastrrr Company (http://www.gasmastrrr.com)
  3. Proposed: As of July 2005, the governments of Italy and Japan are discussing funding a 25 Million Euro research and development project to determine if Mitsubishi's cold fusion research efforts can be expanded to remediate hazardous nuclear waste, by turning radioactive elements into non-radioactive elements.
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Pathway problems

The major problem cold fusion currently has with mainstream science is that new nuclear theories and nuclear pathways must be developed to explain how cold fusion can actually occur at room temperature. The pathways for hot fusion just don't work for cold fusion, which is why mainstream science had such a hard time believing cold fusion claims.

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Additional notes

"Cold Fusion" is a broad term that describes a set of previously unknown nuclear or nuclear/chemical reactions. Other terms that have been adopted to describe "Cold Fusion" type reactions, include:

  • Low Energy Nuclear Reactions (LENR)
  • Chemically Assisted Nuclear Reactions (CANR)
  • Condensed Matter Nuclear Science (CMNS)

This redefining of the term "Cold Fusion" is best illustrated by the fact that the previously named International Conference on Cold Fusion (ICCF) has been changed to International Conference on Condensed Matter Nuclear Science, but it still carries the familiar acronym ICCF.

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External articles

Main

Current news accounts and websites


Department of Energy Report

, Italy)

Reference

  • LENR-CANR.org (http://lenr-canr.org/), an on-line library of over 400 original source scientific papers on cold fusion, from peer reviewed journals and conference proceedings.
  • Cold Fusion Lectures and Essays (http://www.energyscience.org.uk/le/cfindex.htm) (1998) & 'Power from Water: Cold Fusion' (http://www.aspden.org/papers/bib/1994d.htm) (1994): it gives a firsthand thorough account of the efforts and experiments in the development of cold fusion, including the obstruction and hostility done by state agencies and the industry; it presents also the description of this British engineer and physicist, Harold Aspden, GB Patent no. 2,231,195 (1993) and U.S. Patent no. 5,734,122 (1998); it presents published theoretical research.
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