Slashdot Mirror
Independent Researchers Test Rossi's Alleged Cold Fusion Device For 32 Days
WheezyJoe (1168567) writes The E-Cat (or "Energy Catalyzer") is an alleged cold fusion device that produces heat from a low-energy nuclear reaction where nickel and hydrogen fuse into copper. Previous reports have tended to suggest the technology is a hoax, and the inventor Andrea Rossi's reluctance to share details of the device haven't helped the situation. ExtremeTech now reports that "six (reputable) researchers from Italy and Sweden" have "observed a small E-Cat over 32 days, where it produced net energy of 1.5 megawatt-hours, "far more than can be obtained from any known chemical sources in the small reactor volume."... "The researchers, analyzing the fuel before and after the 32-day burn, note that there is an isotope shift from a "natural" mix of Nickel-58/Nickel-60 to almost entirely Nickel-62 — a reaction that, the researchers say, cannot occur without nuclear reactions (i.e. fusion)." The paper (PDF) linked in the article concludes that the E-cat is "a device giving heat energy compatible with nuclear transformations, but it operates at low energy and gives neither nuclear radioactive waste nor emits radiation. From basic general knowledge in nuclear physics this should not be possible. Nevertheless we have to relate to the fact that the experimental results from our test show heat production beyond chemical burning, and that the E-Cat fuel undergoes nuclear transformations. It is certainly most unsatisfying that these results so far have no convincing theoretical explanation, but the experimental results cannot be dismissed or ignored just because of lack of theoretical understanding. Moreover, the E-Cat results are too conspicuous not to be followed up in detail. In addition, if proven sustainable in further tests the E-Cat invention has a large potential to become an important energy source." The observers understandably hedge a bit, though: The researchers are very careful about not actually saying that cold fusion/LENR is the source of the E-Cat’s energy, instead merely saying that an “unknown reaction” is at work. In serious scientific circles, LENR is still a bit of a joke/taboo topic. The paper is actually somewhat comical in this regard: The researchers really try to work out how the E-Cat produces so much darn energy — and they conclude that fusion is the only answer — but then they reel it all back in by adding: “The reaction speculation above should only be considered as an example of reasoning and not a serious conjecture.”
Read the report. The names are at the top.
Giuseppe Levi - Bologna University, Bologna, Italy
Evelyn Foschi - Bologna, Italy
Bo Höistad, Roland Pettersson and Lars Tegnér - Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
Hanno Essén - Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden
Unfortunately, Levi is a long time acquaintance of Rossi, so his independence is hard to justify.
The most glaring of which is there was no proper measurement of heat output - just computed from IR output.
Jeebus:
- They measure 'power output' with a thermal camera in free air - not even the faintest attempt at making a calorimeter.
- Rossi was present at a critical junction in the test 'loading the reactor' (whooo).
The former sounds very, very fishy. You can't measure quantitative thermal output of anything with a thermal camera suspended in a room. A much better method would be to use some sort of calorimeter - something that was enclosed and could measure all of the heat put out by the system.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
You should have professional magicians look at it. These are people who know how to find the "trick".
You nailed it. I was just reading about James Randi's debunking of the alleged psychic Uri Gellar, who had managed to fool a bunch of scientists back in the 1970s. Randi claimed that scientists are some of the easiest people to fool because, as you said, they operate under a lot of preconceived notions and once you figure out how to work around those it's a piece of cake. As Randi put it, to catch a magician (who are essentially people who fool people for a living) you send a magician.
Help save the critically endangered Blue Iguana
Why is this nonsense getting the time of day here? I know the editorial staff doesn't exactly check the sources or the grammar but this article doesn't even pass a sniff test. Why is slashdot giving an obvious charlatan the time of day? "reputable researchers"? Please...
I was just reading about James Randi's debunking of psychic Uri Gellar
Which didn't impact Gellar's career in any way what-so-ever. A bump like that is nothing to a showman. Just look at Randi himself. Remember that bit about identity theft, passport fraud, and a host of other related crimes? Did it affect his "business" in any way? Nope! He's still peddling his own brand of unscientific skepticism to his undereducated followers.
Let's leave research to actual researchers and keep the carnival freaks out of it.
Required reading for internet skeptics
No, they didn't. (Measure all the inputs).
They looked at the instruments set up by Rossi. One of the biggest suspicions is that the Ampmeter is measuring only the current between hot and neutral leads on the input cable, and that the "earth" line is actually being used to supply power.
Once again: they merely observed a device set up by Rossi. They had to take his word that all the instruments were set up correctly, and that they did what he said they did. Even the new round of "testing" isn't actual testing. So there's no verification that it did anything that Rossi said it does.
It's like trusting David Copperfield that his escape box is merely an "ordinary box".
-Erik
There are always four sides to every story: your side, their side, the truth, and what really happened.
Relying on Trade Secrets for this kind of invention is the #1 indicator of fraud. A proper patent would make him rich beyond his imagination. A Trade Secret is only good for fleecing investors.
But you contradict yourself. If (as you said yourself) that he could not get a patent, then trade secret is his only real protection.
I agree that's not a good way to do it, but if that's all you've got, that's what you do.
You should have professional magicians look at it. These are people who know how to find the "trick".
You nailed it.
Not really. Rossi's case is 100% different from professional sleight-of-hand.
The devices are fairly small, so it's easy to isolate them from any conceivable unknown energy input. Electricity input can easily be monitored. Output can easily be monitored. If you have done a careful job of isolation, and the output over time is more than the same amount of mass could produce chemically (i.e., even a super-powered chemical battery), then you have a nuclear reaction. It's that simple.
It isn't as though Rossi had one bolted to a table and wouldn't let anyone under the table to look.
Given a choice between making $400k a year (minus operating and maintenance expenses, which we have no idea of) and potentially making billions off an invention, which would you choose?
There is no invention and thus there is no choice. This is no different however than the scam artists who sell courses on how to get rich selling houses or investing in the stock market rather than actually doing it themselves. They know there is no money in actually doing what they are selling but there is money in convincing gullible people to give them money.
I'm just saying that there is no reason to think he's a hoax just based on his business strategy.
Yes there is. I've worked in and with private equity. I've done fund raising for real companies. I know how real companies do this and you can be sure that this is NOT how honest people sell an invention. This is how a scam artist works. If this were real he would be able to march into any private equity firm on the planet and they would absolutely throw money at him after some due diligence.
Relying on trade secrets is very dangerous. If someone else can independently figure out how it works, and build their own device, then he is left standing naked with no patent protection. He will have nothing. Trade secrets only work for things that are so difficult and complicated that there is little chance of someone else duplicating the invention.
All of your examples support my argument. It's not necessary that the theory be fully detailed, but the structure of the processes are generally understood.
In the example of the dynamo and the motor, much of the behavior of electric currents was already understood, and quantified, as was the fact that a current moving through a wire produces a magnetic field and vice versa. From that point it was an engineering effort (a brilliant one, including the observation that the effects could be usefully scaled up) to construct the useful devices. Faraday knew before he built them how he expected them to work, and why.
The steam engine definitely supports my argument. It was designed as a way to harness the power of expanding steam which was already very well understood, even if the Ideal Gas Law and other supporting theories related to thermodynamics, expansion coefficients, etc. were not. Regardless of all that wasn't known, the designers of steam engines (in their various stages) could explain quite clearly how and why they worked, all the way back to Hero's aeopile.
Rossi's inability to offer an explanation of the E-Cat makes me highly, highly skeptical that it works. Oh, he says words which he calls an explanation, but they fly in the face of already-understood theory, and he offers no explanations about why already-understood theory is wrong.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
Of course not. First, Physics Nobel prizes are given for experimentally tested stuff, not for pure theory, particularly when said theory can (in principle) be subjected to testing at some point. Second, Nobel prizes are never given posthumously. The methods for testing GR were only developed near Einstein's death, and GR was only fully experimentally confirmed after he had already died. Hence, by a+b, no Nobel prize for him. Had he lived a few more years and he'd have won it.
Conservatism: (n.) love of the existing evils. Liberalism: (n.) desire to substitute new evils for the existing ones.
You clearly don't know what you're talking about. He did win the Nobel prize.
As I understand it, it produces heat. Allegedly it produces more heat than can be accounted for by the electrical input. A heat source is a great start, but it takes a lot more than that to generate electricity and feed it to the grid.
This is why he's recognized. E=mc2 is minor. GR is the true genius part.
Einstein's Nobel prize was for the photo-electric effect and not for GR. Einstein could easily have received 4 Nobel prizes: for SR, GR, Photo-electric and his explanation of Brownian motion. This is why he is recognized as a genius, more so than those who actually have won multiple Nobels.
http://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1306/1306.6364.pdf