Is Avoiding the Central Issue Dishonest? The Truth About Cold Fusion's Return

[marcus]

you decide
the headline is something about Back from the Dead

http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/resource/sep04/0904nfus.html

 

[wasteofo2]

Whoppee!
I always loved cold fusion, no one believed me when I explained it was real though :(

 

[Tide]

I think is shows just how desperate some people are for funding these days! :-)

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I think is shows just how desperate some people are for funding these days! :-)

Why do you leap to that conclusion?

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Whoppee!
I always loved cold fusion, no one believed me when I explained it was real though :(

Why did you leap to that conclusion?

 

[Tom McCurdy]

Cold Fusion was one of the first things that facinated me about science. I remeber hearing the story about the high schooll science fair that accidently created cold fusion but no one was able to reproduce it.

 

[Tide]

Why do you leap to that conclusion?

I didn't leap to that conclusion. Cold fusion would require a complete rewrite of everything we know about nuclear and electromagnetic forces and there are NO compelling explanations of how the repulsive Coulomb force between nuclei can be overcome without the expenditure of a commensurate amount of energy. That's simply not available at room temperature. More telling is the fact that not one neutron or other signature of nuclear reactions has ever been observed in any so-called cold fusion experiment.

That the "phenomenon" hasn't been adequately explained is not sufficient reason to toss out more than a century of physics.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Who says we need to toss out anything? As I read the article, the anomalies observed by the Navy Dept deserve further investigation. Now, I'm not saying that they do but you seem to be asssigning an awful lot to this with very little to go on.

 

[Tide]

Who says we need to toss out anything? As I read the article, the anomalies observed by the Navy Dept deserve further investigation. Now, I'm not saying that they do but you seem to be asssigning an awful lot to this with very little to go on.

I don't disagree that something interesting is going nor do I disagree that additional study would be worthwhile. However, you overlook the glaringly obvious implication that it's cold fusion - they refer to it as cold fusion!.

Also, don't presume that I have little to go on. There's a lot of history here!

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I know the history fairly well; in fact I was there when Pons and Fleischmann gave their original presentation to the AES. I think it is more accurate to say that cold fusion research has revealed potential anomolies that appear to be worthy of further investigation.

 

[Tide]

I know the history fairly well; in fact I was there when Pons and Fleischmann gave their original presentation to the AES. I think it is more accurate to say that cold fusion research has revealed potential anomolies that appear to be worthy of further investigation.

And having been part of the fusion community I'm quite familiar with the history and physics of fusion. I've already said there is ample reason for continued investigation but I do object to calling it fusion in the absence of nuclear signatures in any of the experiments and particularly considering that it runs counter to firmly established principles.

 

[Orion1]

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.

Palladium Mass: 106.42 g*cc^-1
Palladium Density: 12.02 g*cc^-1

N_a = 6.022*10^23 atm*mol^-1

$$N_n = N_a \left( \frac{\rho_{Pd}}{M_{Pd}} \right)$$
$$N_n = N_a \left( \frac{12.02 g*cc^{-1}}{106.42 g*mol^{-1}} \right)$$
$$N_n = 6.802*10^{22} atm*cc^-1$$ Pd/D (1/1)

Hydrogen Mass: 1.00794 g*mol^-1
Hydrogen Mass: 2.0141 g*mol^-1

$$\rho_D = \frac{N_n M_D}{N_a} = \rho_{Pd} \left( \frac{M_D}{M_{Pd}} \right)$$

$$\rho_D = \frac{6.802*10^{22} atm*cc^{-1}*2.0141 g*mol^{-1}}{6.022*10^{23} atm*mol^{-1}}$$

$$\rho_D = \rho_{Pd} \left( \frac{M_D}{M_{Pd}} \right)$$
$$\rho_D = .227 g*cc^{-1}$$

Hydrogen ignites with Palladium as a form of catalytic combustion reaction, however this is not nuclear, it is chemical. The reaction itself is exorthermic with the catalysts for the reaction being the applied electrical current (electrochemical) and the Palladium metal itself.

The Pd/D ratio itself (1/1) and the excess drop in thermo production is fairly conclusive that the reaction is an exorthermic electrochemical ignition reaction between Deuterium and the metallic catalyst surface Palladium atoms. With detected byproducts such as He4 or radiation as attributable to naturally occurring laboratory contamination and background radiation emissions. The 'excess heat' itself is attibutable to the release of potential energy of reaction products released by the electrolytic exorthermic system.

However, the Deuterium density produced during this type of electrolysis is impressively high.

Reference:
www.lenr-canr.org/detailonly.htm[/URL]

 

[russ_watters]

you decide

The DOE is going to review a paper. The usual catch-22 applies: by the DOE getting involved, the cold fusion community has a temporary appearance of credibility. Temporary because the DOE will eventually release their findings on the validity of the cold fusion "research"...and "appearance" because there is no real gain in credibility until a positive finding is released.

To stave off Ivan's inevitable conclusion jumping about me, I'm not concluding anything, I'm predicting the DOE will find nothing that merrits further study. Indeed, printing a report on this that suggests cold fusion is back from the dead is unwarranted conclusion jumping.

Ivan, frankly, you're going too far with demands of open mindedness here.

I think it is more accurate to say that cold fusion research has revealed potential anomolies that appear to be worthy of further investigation.

Ok, so what exactly does that mean? Do you think fusion has been observed or not? IMO, if there are phenomena worthy of study they should be studied (that's kinda self-evident). But calling the research "cold fusion" research is inaccurate if the research isn't leading toward cold fusion.

My problem with this, Ivan, is that people have made a lot of money by duping the public and the government with cold fusion claims. Their burden of proof is therefore extremely heavy - and rightly so.

Also, the fact that the Navy continues to work on this disheartens me as a former sailor. I can't believe they are funding known frauds.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Obviously the DOE feels that this deserves another look. My only argument is that no one here is qualified to dispute this decision. I expect that they will find nothing.

 

[K.J.Healey]

I work at the DOE, Sandia Labs, but obviously not on cold fusion. But I have talked to a few physicists here who worked on the project back in the 80s. They all claim that they never really saw any evidence of the process working beyond the error bars for enviromental effects. I'll have to ask them what they think of this.

 

[polyb]

Cold Fusion Back From the Dead ?

I came across this one from the IEEE Spectrum online site. It seems that the USN has been carrying on with the research that was debunked 15 years ago. Apparently they have produced results consistent with the claims made by Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischmann. Here is the link:

http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/resource/sep04/0904nfus.html

Also, here is the paper presented at the Tenth International Conference on Cold Fusion, who would have guessed that there were any conferences on this topic! The link:

Thermal behavior of polarized Pd/D electrodes prepared

What do you guys think? Is the Navy trying to justify more funding for a dead-end research program or are they really onto something. It does seem plausible that they do have a motivated interest in the cold fusion claim considering it would be useful in military transport with a much lower risk than current nuclear propulsion devices.

 

[russ_watters]

This has been discussed before, so I'll be brief. You need to be a little careful that you don't read into this more than they actually say. For example:

Apparently they [the US Navy] have produced results consistent with the claims made by Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischmann.

Where in the article does it say that?

Also, here is the paper presented at the Tenth International Conference on Cold Fusion, who would have guessed that there were any conferences on this topic!

Why not? There are conferences on everything else - ET, perpetual motion machines, ghosts, ESP, etc. Just having a conference doesn't say anything at all about who is there or the legitimacy of what goes on there.

What do you guys think? Is the Navy trying to justify more funding for a dead-end research program or are they really onto something.

The article says the Navy is doing some research, but it doesn't say the Navy is behind the "panel of experts" making a presentation to the DOE.

The DOE may well say there is an electrochemical process at work that's worth studying, but I'd be extremely surprised if it has any connection with actual fusion. About the only thing we can be sure of from P&F's incident a decade ago is that they did not see any fusion take place.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Note that I merged polyb's new post with this thread.

 

[polyb]

Sorry about that guys, I didnt see the other posting.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Sorry about that guys, I didnt see the other posting.

No problem.

 

[russ_watters]

Note that I merged polyb's new post with this thread.

Good, 'cause it was either that or I'm hallucinating again...

 

[pelastration]

I work at the DOE, Sandia Labs, but obviously not on cold fusion. But I have talked to a few physicists here who worked on the project back in the 80s. They all claim that they never really saw any evidence of the process working beyond the error bars for enviromental effects. I'll have to ask them what they think of this.

Hi Healey,

I just applied for two patents on a new type power plant. Gravitational power. Serious. Nothing to do with Zero-point. New type of generators. Any idea how to introduce it at DOE? I am from Belgium, that may complicate.

 

[Chronos]

A little late to apply for that patent. It is called the hydroelectric plant.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

well...actually that is a solar powered system, but point taken.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

By request, the conversation about Pelastrations idea is split to this thread:

https://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=46849

 

[ynot]

The story seems slanted toward overt optimism. I don't personally take the word of Electrical Engineers on nuclear physics. I don't mind that someone is looking at it, but we've been through this before. We need proof than anecdotes.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Cold fusion and Trojan horse mechanism
Matti Pitkänen
Department of Physics, Theoretical Physics Division,
P.O. Box 9 Fin-00014, University of Helsinki, Finland
The first claim for cold fusion [PonsF] dates back to March 23, 1989, when Pons and Fleischmann announced that nuclear fusion, producing usable amounts of heat, could be induced to take place on a table-top by electrolyzing heavy water and using electrodes made of Pd and platinum. Various laboratories allover the world tried to reproduce the experiments. The poor reproducibility and the absence of the typical side products of nuclear fusion (gamma rays and neutrons) led soon to the conlusion (represented in the dramatic session of American Physical Society May 1, 1989) that nuclear fusion cannot explain the heat production. Main stream scientists made final conclusions about the subject of 'cold fusion' and cold fusion people became a pariah class of the scientific community.

The work with cold fusion however continued and gradually situation has changed. It became clear that nuclear reaction products, mainly ^4He, are present. Gradually also the reasons for the poor reproducibility of the experiments became better understood. A representative example about the change of the attitudes is the article of Schwinger [Schwinger] in which cold fusion is taken seriously. The article also demonstrates that the counter arguments of hot fusion people are based on the implicit assumption that hot fusion theory describes cold fusion despite the fact that the physical situations are radically different. The development on the experimental side has been based on techniques involving the use of catalysis, nanotechnology, electrolysis, glow discharge and ultrasonic cavitation. There are now public demonstrations of cold fusion reactors, whose output energy far exceeds input energy and commercial applications are under intensive development, see for instance the homepage of Russ George [rgeorge], for whom I am grateful for informing me about the recent state of cold fusion. [continued]

http://www.physics.helsinki.fi/~matpitka/coldf.html

 

[polyb]

Thanx Ivan!

I need some time to read the article, but it looks like they are making progress!

 

[bsr]

Perhaps it is possible that the original Pons Fleischman experiment was real, and it was successful because of some oscillating magnetic fields in the room? A nearby transformer in the wall or a magnetic field produced by unrelated equipment, in the megahertz range, could be why it worked. Bubble fusion? Sonoluminescence? All use supersonic waves. Hmmm... if I had some palladium rods I would try that experiment again with a strong magnetic oscillation.

 

[russ_watters]

Fyi, the report that got this thread going is out and the verdict is in. Any guesses what that verdict was...?

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Judging your posture it clearly was negative. Could you post your source? Even so, I did some checking and the physicist from Helsinki is no lightweight. This still seems to be an issue.

 

[polyb]

Judging your posture it clearly was negative. Could you post your source? Even so, I did some checking and the physicist from Helsinki is no lightweight. This still seems to be an issue.

Ivan I doubt he read it, questioning his own prejudice would be out of character! But you really can't blame russ, he's an engineer!

I still have not read through all of it but I was surprised to see Schwinger chiming in on the subject. It seems that he picked up on the research during the early nineties when sonoluminescence and cold fusion were being explored. Though the cold part was dropped it appears that a fusion process has been confirmed by using bubble cavitation in an acetone solution. Neat stuff!

Here is the press release from last year on fusion:
http://www.rpi.edu/web/News/press_releases/2004/lahey.htm

 

[Ivan Seeking]

uh oh, we may be underestimating Russ here

The America Physical Society will feature a full session presenting solid state (cold) fusion papers on Thursday March 24th at the Los Angeles Convention Center. This APS presentation of work in the field follows the recent (Dec. 1, 2004) DOE report which acknowledges cold fusion experimental results have now convinced the DOE that the field is indeed real science and the earlier US Navy report giving unreserved support for findings in the field.

http://meetings.aps.org/Meeting/MAR05/SessionIndex/55/?SessionEventID=28515

...couldn't bring yourself to announce this yourself Russ?

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Well now...

Cold Fusion Gets Chilly Encore
Claims of cold fusion are no more convincing today than they were 15 years ago. That's the conclusion of the Department of Energy's fresh look at advances in extracting energy from low-energy nuclear reactions. A report released on 1 December 2004 echoes DOE's 1989 study that followed the headline-making claims of cold fusion by Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischmann. [continued]

http://www.physicstoday.org/vol-58/iss-1/p31a.html

I'll sort this out later tonight when I have a little more time

 

[russ_watters]

Ivan I doubt he read it, questioning his own prejudice would be out of character! But you really can't blame russ, he's an engineer!

If I hadn't read it, I wouldn't have known that it said almost exactly what I said it would say. And then I wouldn't have had the smug posture that Ivan detected.

There were 18 reviewers with 18 separate opinions, but the basic opinion was, essentially, 'yawn: not much has happened in 15 years and broad federal funding for research is not warranted (but, as always, there is no reason not to review individual proposals).'

Story and a copy of the summary here: http://www.physicstoday.org/vol-58/iss-1/p31a.html

Claims of cold fusion are no more convincing today than they were 15 years ago. That's the conclusion of the Department of Energy's fresh look at advances in extracting energy from low-energy nuclear reactions.

The report is in pdf, so I can't copy and paste excerpts, and I'm too lazy to type out quotes. Its only about a 5 page read though...