Cold Fusion, Looks like it isn't Si-Fi anymore!!

[TreverSlyFox]

I remember as a kid in the 50s and 60s that "Cold Fusion" was the stuff of Si-Fi and Comic Books., it seems that has changed a little since then. In March, 1989 Dr. Martin Fleischmann (Southhamption Unv.) and Dr. Stanley Pons (Utah Unv.) reported they did it. A few months later at MIT, Dr. Richard Petrasso and Dr. Ronald Parker reported it was BS because their experiments to reproduce the same thing didn't show it. It was found out later they "juggled" the data and "planted" the story in the "Boston Hearld" to dis-credit Fleischmann & Pons.


Since then the position today is that cold fusion has been experimentally reproduced and measured by more than 100 universities and commercial laboratories in 10 countries around the world. U.S. Laboratories reporting positive results include the Los Alamos National Laboratory, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, (these were the two U.S. research establishments most closely involved in developing the atomic bomb) Naval Research Laboratory, Naval Weapons Centre at China Lake, Naval Ocean Systems Centre and Texas A & M University. Dr Robert Bush and his colleagues at California Polytechnic Institute have recorded the highest levels of power density for cold fusion, with almost three kilowatts per cubic centimetre. This is 30 times greater than the power density of fuel rods in a typical nuclear fission reactor.


Isn't it interesting that we hear NOTHING about this during High Oil Prices, the Peak Oil Debate, and Gas running $2.00 a gallon. Wonder why?

Check out the story and the Pictures are WAY COOL! :cool:

http://www.alternativescience.com/cold_fusion.htm

jlnlabs.online.fr/ cfr/html/cfrdatas.htm

[Jacks Complete]

At three Kilowatts per cubic centimeter, nothing about the system is going to be cold, but a lot is going to be fused!

You do know they are just sticking a SAW into two electrodes in some sea water, don't you? Most of the reported power output has been down to not being able to measure the input power properly.

Cold fusion is likely BS, and even if it is going to work, the outputs are never, ever going to be anything like that high.

My personal favorite is that the energy out is going to turn out to be something out-gassing dependant. It is about the only thing that fits the "recharging" time that samples have been found to need. Perhaps a slight electro-chemical reaction with dissolved CO2 and the electrodes...

The only interesting thing is that the US (Army?) have just put $10million into a research project.

Still, from small oddities great industries grow (Nukes, semiconductors, superconductors) so when $10million is chump change, it is almost certainly worth looking.

[megalomania]

Ahh fusion, the technology that has been a mere ten years away for the past 50 years! WHile cold fusion may not be BS, using it as a source of energy certainly is. I think those energy conspircy nuts give the big bad oil companies far too much importance. We would have plenty of energy if we used nuclear power, and we all know it really works.

[Silentnite]

Why does it have to be Cold fusion? Any fusion is good. We all know that Fusion results in more energy then Fission. And I don't see why it would be so hard.

But Mega's right. Why isn't there more Nuclear plants around? I remember in highschool we had to do a presentation on whether or not we should(theoretically) build a new reactor in Michigan. A suprising percentage(Over 75%) said no. Those poor brainwashed little souls. While most of them recieved low grades due to "Well, I think its like this cause my parent says its so", more of the people who voted yes actually did research and recieved a higher grade.

I love that teacher. Hooray for Nuclear Fission!

[Valinomycin]

IMHO cold fusion is crap they didn't even manage to reproduce their results themselves nor anyone else was able to do so. but there are other promising fusion technologies e.g. bubble fusion.

nuclear power is quite good but it has three major disatvantages:
- high effort to get uran/plutonium
- nuclear waste is a danger for generations
- risk of accidents (for example Tschernobyl)
but i also think that it's much better than fossile fuels because these also cause pollution.

[Mortis Lupus]

Scientists want to make Cold fusion work because it doesn’t need plasma at temps around 10^8 Kelvin, which makes it quite hard to contain. I’m not sure about cold fusion, but hot fusion is hard because it is difficult to contain the plasma at the right temp / density for long periods of time, it has only been maintained for around 4 seconds IIRC.

[Silentnite]

That doesn't explain why we still don't have more Nuclear reactors. I recall hearing that France is almost entirely run on Nuclear power, but I could definetly be mistaken. If fusion is hard to do, just do Fission...

Damn Sheeple.

[akinrog]

IRRC, the problem associated with the "Cold Fusion" process is amount of neutrons released is far less than a "regular fusion".

While first onset of cold fusion created a great clamour, the scientific circles argued that it cannot be any fusion process since amount of released neutrons are far less than any regular fusion.

As far as I read about the issue, "cold fusion" produces more energy than it is supplied with. And not only American institutions are interested but many industrialized nations continue research on it, trying to describe what takes place in crystal lattice of the hydrogen (or more correctly deuterium) absorbing metals, during cold fusion process.

Many scientists challenges the cold fusion process due to above mentioned scientific bottlenecks. In addition in some experiments scientists showed that some other metals (IIRC zinc chilled to very low temperatures) cast neutrons when stressed by mechanical forces.

As you know I am a conspiracy freak, it might be likely some fat assed bosses are trying to preclude such a revolutionary power source. But I don't think they may prevent such a simple thing to realize per se.

If we look at the issue at uthopian point of view, the cold fusion may be "Panacea" the world is looking for solving the energy problem of the world. But who knows maybe some day.

[tmp]

The anti-nuclear power nutjobs have succeeded in preventing any new
plant licenses begin issued by the NRC. Since the widely publicized
accidents at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, those who oppose nuclear
power for peace want governments to promote and pay for alternative
power sources such as solar, wind, geothermal, and biomass. The 9/11
attacks didn't help either. Now there's heightened concern over security
at current fission plants with the worry that terrorists will steal radioactive
wastes and manufacture a radiation dispersal bomb.

My brother was on site at Three Mile Island during the accident. He doesn't
glow in the dark, have cancer, or children born with 3 eyes. The anti-nuke
nuts, my roomate being 1 of them, spread lies about atomic power to
prevent its further development. Fuck those morons !

[10fingers]

IIRC there hasn't been nuclear reactor built in the US for 10 or 20 years. I think the reason is 3 Mile Island and Chernoybl. People are afraid of anything nuclear, it's politics.
If you calculated all the damage that's done by burning fossil fuels, to people and the environment, it's far greater than anything nuclear has done or most likely ever will.
I would prefer fusion than fission though. It's cleaner and there is more fuel available for a fusion reactor. Eventually the supply of Uranium will be depleted and then you would have to go to a breeder reactor using plutonium. A lot of hazardous waste involved here.
I think that eventually they will get fusion figured out whether hot or cold. It's kind of ironic that while the world begs and grovels for energy that there is an unlimited supply locked up in the atoms all around us.

[Skean Dhu]

As 10fingers pointed out, we have used most of the uranium available to us. And I think most of the anti-nuke freaks are more concerned with the nuclear waste presently created than the actual threat of a melt-down on the scale of 3-mile or Chernoybl. Or atleast any anti-nuke freak thats worth arguing with.

Although for all the shit flying about USSR fissionable material strewn about eurasia I really don't se why the US couldn't take it all and put it to good use. Two birds w/ one stone, gets rid of all the stray fissionable material the terrorists can't have it if its in use, and gives us electricity .

[shooter3]

Look up "Integral Fast Reactor". This is the baby that Clinton killed. It makes more fuel than it uses, burns up its own waste, and uses un-stealable metalic fuel. It can be standardized and massed produced(at least the major components. It CAN'T "run away". It uses liquid sodium(high thermal mass). There is enough already mined Uranium to last several hundred years.
Atomic power was killed by the Enviromental Wacko's that were funded by the oil companies, through pressure on those Bastards in Washington. Their greed will cause WW-3.
We need to repeal a multitude of of un-neccessary regulations and let the free market take over, with a government guarantee that if Congress screws up again, the investors can sue the Government and the people who caused said debacle.
The resulting power should cost much less than coal.

[densest]

Chernobyl pretty well sealed the doom of commercial nuclear power in the US. The swath of you-can't-live-there is hundreds of square miles. Now, it was a bunch of idiots doing unauthorized (or so the others say) experiments on an outdated reactor with bad maintenance.... but it is -un-be-lievably- difficult to get craftsmen to do their jobs the way the engineers specifed. Whatsis-yankee plant stank of piss for a year or two ''cause the builders took a whiz whereever. France is going to have a -real- big problem when they have to decommision their plants Real Soon Now. Embrittlement will kill any metal sooner or later. Talk to a Brit about Sellafield. And I don't buy European mushrooms any more because they concentrate all sorts of trace metals and some serious mycologists who I trust with my life repeatedly say that the levels of Caesium <isotope> and so on were so high on some samples they found in Europe that they would only have brought them back in little lead bags, and then where the heck to store them in the collection?

Summary: it's unlikely that the plant will be built as designed, or run as specified, and dismantling is something that the entire industry goes white and has other appointments if you bring up the topic.

Of course, we put a large quantity of radioisotopes into the ecosystem by burning coal and oil, but the particular ones are not well absorbed and are not high energy particle emitters, so the damage to living things is not equivalent.

If you can figure out how to take a large factory building, dismantle it, and turn it into nice dust-free blocks which we can hide somewhere, all without any gaseous, liquid, or solid escapes, you've got a ticket for $billllllllions$$$$$$, because nobody else has the slightest idea.

Oh yes... do you have any Neodymium-Iron-Boron magnets? The monazite sand where the rare earths live is chock full of thorium, not very radioactive, but.... heh heh heh

End of random rant.

[Anthony]

Whats wrong with spent nuclear power plants? They're out in the middle of nowhere, put a fence around it and don't go there for a few hundred years. heck, employ a couple of security guards to keep kids out if necessary. There are old buildings littered all over the world.

Anyway, it's not like these plaes are going to glow in the dark. It was safe for workers to be in there everyday, afterall.

[Bert]

Given that large population masses aren't likely going to be switched to green energy (solar, wind, geothermal, tidal, etc.) the only short term technologically feasible replacement for burning hydrocarbons is going to be fission. The current scenario with fuel rods and circulating high pressure water or Sodium metal is descended from Hyman Rickover's original design for submarine propulsion. It was never the safest technology, and I'm quite surprised that the world has only sustained one Chernobyl scale reactor accident.

Take a look at what the Chinese are doing. (http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.09/china.html) They are quite aware of what the US intends by controlling world oil and natural gas supplies, and are not going to be constrained by us nor leave themselves vulnerable to peak oil (http://www.asponews.org/).

The "pebble bed" reactor scheme was originated in the US in the 40's and a prototype was constructed in Germany during the 80's. Pity we will not be using it anytime soon.

[Boomer]

We vistied that reactor before the environidiots had it shut down. The pebbles are the size of tennis balls and really sturdy. The threw them on concrete to show us how safe they are, and even let us handle one. Either the un-used ones are not that radioactive unless heaped up, or it was a dummy, they did not tell.

The main feature of that reactor type is that a meltdown is simply not possible, as the reaction is self-quenching (by loss of the carbon used to moderate the fast neutrons).

[Bert]

The main feature of that reactor type is that a meltdown is simply not possible, as the reaction is self-quenching (by loss of the carbon used to moderate the fast neutrons).

My understanding is that with proper design, the maximum reactor core temperature is limited by the thermal expansion of the fuel, which decreases the density of the fuel and so lowers the rate of reaction.

[Valinomycin]

Look up "Integral Fast Reactor". This is the baby that Clinton killed. It makes more fuel than it uses, burns up its own waste, and uses un-stealable metalic fuel. It can be standardized and massed produced(at least the major components. It CAN'T "run away". I the proble mwith those reactors is thar thy produce plutonium suited for nuclear weapons thts the problem why thy stopped testing them in germany

[nbk2000]

One thing I read about the chinese reactors is that they use helium as the heat-transfer medium.

Where are the only two sources of helium in the world located? :D

How few years till they're dry?

The law of the minimum strikes again! :p

[malzraa]

Titanium and Palladium catalyzed fusion are pretty much debunked as pseudoscience, however, there are many innovations in the are of alternative fusion reactors. For example, I am currently working to construct and IEC (Inertial Electostatic Confinement) reactor to use as a neutron source and experimenting tool in my laboratory. Here is a picture of one constructed by a guy by the name of Brian McDermott- http://www.brian-mcdermott.com/neutr002.jpg

[Bert]

I am currently working to construct and IEC (Inertial Electostatic Confinement) reactor to use as a neutron source and experimenting tool in my laboratory. http://www.brian-mcdermott.com/neutr002.jpg

Interesting. What energies can be produced by this process?

[tmp]

I know that most of the helium produced in the world comes from Texas.
Some of it comes out of Poland. There's nothing like having the world by
the balls for this essential element. :D

[malzraa]

Unfortunately, IEC fusion cannot produce even breakeven energies. However, it can be a cheap neutron source and a interesting research tool. In the future, if some major breakthoughs occur, it may produce power, but so far the device cannot be used as a power supply.

[Bert]

Unfortunately, IEC fusion cannot produce even breakeven energies.

No, I meant to ask what energy the NEUTRONS produced by the process might have. I understand that it is not an energy producing reaction. Also wondering how tightly pulsed the neutron production might be. I think you can guess the application I'm thinking of.

[Bert]

Unfortunately, IEC fusion cannot produce even breakeven energies.

No, I meant to ask what energy the NEUTRONS produced by the process might have. I understand that it is not an energy producing reaction. Also wondering how tightly pulsed the neutron production might be. I think you can guess the application I'm thinking of.

[Bert]

Unfortunately, IEC fusion cannot produce even breakeven energies.

No, I meant to ask what energy the NEUTRONS produced by the process might have. I understand that it is not an energy producing reaction. Also wondering how tightly pulsed the neutron production might be. I think you can guess the application I'm thinking of.

[malzraa]

Ahhh, I never thought of that application. In a deuterium only fusor, there is a 50:50 chance of the emission of either a 2.45 MeV neutron or a 3 MeV proton. In Tritium mixed reactions the energy as well as neutron count increases. A massive power supply would be needed to create a lethal flux of neutrons. BUT, the device can also run in a pulse mode, so if one could perhaps rig a destructive power supply (ie Flux Compression Generator) coupled with a capacitor array, one could channel the energy from a high voltage power supply and a large explosive charge into a massive, armor penetrationg neutron pulse. Brilliant!

[malzraa]

Ahhh, I never thought of that application. In a deuterium only fusor, there is a 50:50 chance of the emission of either a 2.45 MeV neutron or a 3 MeV proton. In Tritium mixed reactions the energy as well as neutron count increases. A massive power supply would be needed to create a lethal flux of neutrons. BUT, the device can also run in a pulse mode, so if one could perhaps rig a destructive power supply (ie Flux Compression Generator) coupled with a capacitor array, one could channel the energy from a high voltage power supply and a large explosive charge into a massive, armor penetrationg neutron pulse. Brilliant!

[malzraa]

Ahhh, I never thought of that application. In a deuterium only fusor, there is a 50:50 chance of the emission of either a 2.45 MeV neutron or a 3 MeV proton. In Tritium mixed reactions the energy as well as neutron count increases. A massive power supply would be needed to create a lethal flux of neutrons. BUT, the device can also run in a pulse mode, so if one could perhaps rig a destructive power supply (ie Flux Compression Generator) coupled with a capacitor array, one could channel the energy from a high voltage power supply and a large explosive charge into a massive, armor penetrationg neutron pulse. Brilliant!

[Silentnite]

Wait a minute. A Flux Compression Generator?? How soon until Marty McFly can go back to the wild west? Or is that a completely different thing? I am just kidding.

If I recall, tritium is rather unstable compared to Deutrium, and harder to get right? And dueutrium is only 1 part per hundred of water. I know I am getting my figures wrong somewhere. But how much harder would it be to use completely tritium. And is the supply exhaustable? I mean, do you fill it once with Deutrium or Tritium and leave it or does it gradually convert to something else.

[Silentnite]

Wait a minute. A Flux Compression Generator?? How soon until Marty McFly can go back to the wild west? Or is that a completely different thing? I am just kidding.

If I recall, tritium is rather unstable compared to Deutrium, and harder to get right? And dueutrium is only 1 part per hundred of water. I know I am getting my figures wrong somewhere. But how much harder would it be to use completely tritium. And is the supply exhaustable? I mean, do you fill it once with Deutrium or Tritium and leave it or does it gradually convert to something else.

[Silentnite]

Wait a minute. A Flux Compression Generator?? How soon until Marty McFly can go back to the wild west? Or is that a completely different thing? I am just kidding.

If I recall, tritium is rather unstable compared to Deutrium, and harder to get right? And dueutrium is only 1 part per hundred of water. I know I am getting my figures wrong somewhere. But how much harder would it be to use completely tritium. And is the supply exhaustable? I mean, do you fill it once with Deutrium or Tritium and leave it or does it gradually convert to something else.

[Bert]

Tritium is bred in reactors, half life less than a dozen years, not found in nature. Not available in meaningful quantities OTC. Nuclear weapons (or nite sites) need their Tritium replaced fairly often to maintain performance. Deuterium is stable, and Lithium 6 deuteride targets would store well- Home made "poor boy" neutron bombs, anyone?

A flux generator is not a "flux capacitor" and probably doesn't do much for your De Loreans performance.

[Bert]

Tritium is bred in reactors, half life less than a dozen years, not found in nature. Not available in meaningful quantities OTC. Nuclear weapons (or nite sites) need their Tritium replaced fairly often to maintain performance. Deuterium is stable, and Lithium 6 deuteride targets would store well- Home made "poor boy" neutron bombs, anyone?

A flux generator is not a "flux capacitor" and probably doesn't do much for your De Loreans performance.

[Bert]

Tritium is bred in reactors, half life less than a dozen years, not found in nature. Not available in meaningful quantities OTC. Nuclear weapons (or nite sites) need their Tritium replaced fairly often to maintain performance. Deuterium is stable, and Lithium 6 deuteride targets would store well- Home made "poor boy" neutron bombs, anyone?

A flux generator is not a "flux capacitor" and probably doesn't do much for your De Loreans performance.

[Pb1]

And dueutrium is only 1 part per hundred of water. I know I am getting my figures wrong somewhere.

Deuterium is a little rarer than that. Heavy water only makes up about 1/6000th of any given sample.

[Pb1]

And dueutrium is only 1 part per hundred of water. I know I am getting my figures wrong somewhere.

Deuterium is a little rarer than that. Heavy water only makes up about 1/6000th of any given sample.

[Pb1]

And dueutrium is only 1 part per hundred of water. I know I am getting my figures wrong somewhere.

Deuterium is a little rarer than that. Heavy water only makes up about 1/6000th of any given sample.

[Bugger]

If cold fusion, apparently obtained by fusing deuterium nuclei to mostly Helium-4 by adsorbing them onto a palladium substrate (a very rare metal - platinum and possibly nickel might also be usable at least under raised pressure as they also absorb large quantities of hydrogen) according to the claims of Pons and Fleichmann, is for real, for adoption as a power source it would also have to be practical in terms of the value of the energy output relative to the cost of separating deuterium and obtaining the metal substrate, and in terms of the rate of the fusion reaction. It would have to be a lot cheaper than hot fusion of deuterium ions, as a hot gaseous plasma confined by intense toroidal magnetic fields, which has so far proven to be impractical due to technical problems in confining the plasma and at the same time getting radiation energy out of it safely. Who else besides Pons and Fleichmann say they have confirmed cold fusion?

[Bugger]

If cold fusion, apparently obtained by fusing deuterium nuclei to mostly Helium-4 by adsorbing them onto a palladium substrate (a very rare metal - platinum and possibly nickel might also be usable at least under raised pressure as they also absorb large quantities of hydrogen) according to the claims of Pons and Fleichmann, is for real, for adoption as a power source it would also have to be practical in terms of the value of the energy output relative to the cost of separating deuterium and obtaining the metal substrate, and in terms of the rate of the fusion reaction. It would have to be a lot cheaper than hot fusion of deuterium ions, as a hot gaseous plasma confined by intense toroidal magnetic fields, which has so far proven to be impractical due to technical problems in confining the plasma and at the same time getting radiation energy out of it safely. Who else besides Pons and Fleichmann say they have confirmed cold fusion?

[Bugger]

If cold fusion, apparently obtained by fusing deuterium nuclei to mostly Helium-4 by adsorbing them onto a palladium substrate (a very rare metal - platinum and possibly nickel might also be usable at least under raised pressure as they also absorb large quantities of hydrogen) according to the claims of Pons and Fleichmann, is for real, for adoption as a power source it would also have to be practical in terms of the value of the energy output relative to the cost of separating deuterium and obtaining the metal substrate, and in terms of the rate of the fusion reaction. It would have to be a lot cheaper than hot fusion of deuterium ions, as a hot gaseous plasma confined by intense toroidal magnetic fields, which has so far proven to be impractical due to technical problems in confining the plasma and at the same time getting radiation energy out of it safely. Who else besides Pons and Fleichmann say they have confirmed cold fusion?

[akinrog]

Who else besides Pons and Fleichmann say they have confirmed cold fusion?

In my previous post, I forgot to add that there is also a reproducibility problem with the experiment although during that cold fusion rush of 80s, almost every laboratory on earth claimed that they reproduced the results that pons and fleischmann obtained. In addition, some laboratories even attained some heat evolution with ordinary water and nickel. However, after the first wave of cold fusion rush, the technology or research has lost its popularity (since its genuinity maybe rightfully denied by academic circles) and continued to be researched underhand. So majority of the reports regarding cold fusion today are mainly rumours not scientific articles.

[akinrog]

Who else besides Pons and Fleichmann say they have confirmed cold fusion?

In my previous post, I forgot to add that there is also a reproducibility problem with the experiment although during that cold fusion rush of 80s, almost every laboratory on earth claimed that they reproduced the results that pons and fleischmann obtained. In addition, some laboratories even attained some heat evolution with ordinary water and nickel. However, after the first wave of cold fusion rush, the technology or research has lost its popularity (since its genuinity maybe rightfully denied by academic circles) and continued to be researched underhand. So majority of the reports regarding cold fusion today are mainly rumours not scientific articles.

[akinrog]

Who else besides Pons and Fleichmann say they have confirmed cold fusion?

In my previous post, I forgot to add that there is also a reproducibility problem with the experiment although during that cold fusion rush of 80s, almost every laboratory on earth claimed that they reproduced the results that pons and fleischmann obtained. In addition, some laboratories even attained some heat evolution with ordinary water and nickel. However, after the first wave of cold fusion rush, the technology or research has lost its popularity (since its genuinity maybe rightfully denied by academic circles) and continued to be researched underhand. So majority of the reports regarding cold fusion today are mainly rumours not scientific articles.

[grendel23]

If anyone is interested in the true (and rather pathetic) story behind cold fusion, read a book called "Bad Science : The Short Life and Weird Times of Cold Fusion" by Gary Taubes.
Ego, greed and incompetence make for an interesting read, but poor science.

[grendel23]

If anyone is interested in the true (and rather pathetic) story behind cold fusion, read a book called "Bad Science : The Short Life and Weird Times of Cold Fusion" by Gary Taubes.
Ego, greed and incompetence make for an interesting read, but poor science.

[grendel23]

If anyone is interested in the true (and rather pathetic) story behind cold fusion, read a book called "Bad Science : The Short Life and Weird Times of Cold Fusion" by Gary Taubes.
Ego, greed and incompetence make for an interesting read, but poor science.

[Marvin]

"almost every laboratory on earth claimed that they reproduced the results that pons and fleischmann obtained"

Err, thats a very long way from the case. There were a whole bunch of confirmations very quickly after the initial annoucement (the pons and fleischmann result was annouced at a press call, not printed in a journal) and no initial rebutalls.

Theres a good reason for this and its a systemic problem with the way science is done. When you try someone elses experiment and get positive result, even if its not exactly the same result as the original, you dont spend the time checking the results - you publish as quickly as possible to claim reconigition in the lit. If works you succeeded, its news, if you fail to reproduce the effect, youve failed, it isn't news even if the reason is that the original claim is wrong. So you check the equipment, and the maths, and the method, rebuild everything, clean it, do it again, talk to other people. You only end up publishing when every possible objection to your method has been ironed out. Unfortunatly, during this time half the planet actually bilieves there has been a major breakthough. I think the price of palladium was 3 times its usual at one point.

I know someone who did experiments at the time and produced some excess heat, in theory (ie after a lot of sums, rather than things boiling over on a watch battery) and many orders of magnetude below what could have been cold fusion, but the supervisor more or less forced the publication of an article confirming they had done CF on the basis of those results. The supervisor wanted a published article to justify the money the lab had been spending and to get more money for other projects.

Today CF is still being tried, and some people report excess heat, some trace helium production, some trace tritium production, even some report neutrons (and are geneally laughed at by the rest - even psudoscience has a pecking order). The physics and chemistry are pretty clear. It shouldnt work and the reliable experiments are equially clear, it doesnt work.

[Marvin]

"almost every laboratory on earth claimed that they reproduced the results that pons and fleischmann obtained"

Err, thats a very long way from the case. There were a whole bunch of confirmations very quickly after the initial annoucement (the pons and fleischmann result was annouced at a press call, not printed in a journal) and no initial rebutalls.

Theres a good reason for this and its a systemic problem with the way science is done. When you try someone elses experiment and get positive result, even if its not exactly the same result as the original, you dont spend the time checking the results - you publish as quickly as possible to claim reconigition in the lit. If works you succeeded, its news, if you fail to reproduce the effect, youve failed, it isn't news even if the reason is that the original claim is wrong. So you check the equipment, and the maths, and the method, rebuild everything, clean it, do it again, talk to other people. You only end up publishing when every possible objection to your method has been ironed out. Unfortunatly, during this time half the planet actually bilieves there has been a major breakthough. I think the price of palladium was 3 times its usual at one point.

I know someone who did experiments at the time and produced some excess heat, in theory (ie after a lot of sums, rather than things boiling over on a watch battery) and many orders of magnetude below what could have been cold fusion, but the supervisor more or less forced the publication of an article confirming they had done CF on the basis of those results. The supervisor wanted a published article to justify the money the lab had been spending and to get more money for other projects.

Today CF is still being tried, and some people report excess heat, some trace helium production, some trace tritium production, even some report neutrons (and are geneally laughed at by the rest - even psudoscience has a pecking order). The physics and chemistry are pretty clear. It shouldnt work and the reliable experiments are equially clear, it doesnt work.

[Marvin]

"almost every laboratory on earth claimed that they reproduced the results that pons and fleischmann obtained"

Err, thats a very long way from the case. There were a whole bunch of confirmations very quickly after the initial annoucement (the pons and fleischmann result was annouced at a press call, not printed in a journal) and no initial rebutalls.

Theres a good reason for this and its a systemic problem with the way science is done. When you try someone elses experiment and get positive result, even if its not exactly the same result as the original, you dont spend the time checking the results - you publish as quickly as possible to claim reconigition in the lit. If works you succeeded, its news, if you fail to reproduce the effect, youve failed, it isn't news even if the reason is that the original claim is wrong. So you check the equipment, and the maths, and the method, rebuild everything, clean it, do it again, talk to other people. You only end up publishing when every possible objection to your method has been ironed out. Unfortunatly, during this time half the planet actually bilieves there has been a major breakthough. I think the price of palladium was 3 times its usual at one point.

I know someone who did experiments at the time and produced some excess heat, in theory (ie after a lot of sums, rather than things boiling over on a watch battery) and many orders of magnetude below what could have been cold fusion, but the supervisor more or less forced the publication of an article confirming they had done CF on the basis of those results. The supervisor wanted a published article to justify the money the lab had been spending and to get more money for other projects.

Today CF is still being tried, and some people report excess heat, some trace helium production, some trace tritium production, even some report neutrons (and are geneally laughed at by the rest - even psudoscience has a pecking order). The physics and chemistry are pretty clear. It shouldnt work and the reliable experiments are equially clear, it doesnt work.

[Desmikes]

Good things are happening in the world of EARTH-based controlled fusion. ITER http://www.iter.org/index.htm is the latest huge project that will aim to bring fusion power generation to the horizon. I am happy for the physics community that managed to get the funding for something of this scale (12billion USD), and so little promise (the sad truth). Fusion will never be used for large-scale power generation, but at least they are bound to learn something new from this experiment.

I am glad to see that the world is starting to get over the malicious antinuclear propaganda. While masses still believe in 60s myths of genetic mutation, while people will never believe that simply glassifying nuclear waste and letting it sink in the mud beds of the ocean is 100% SAFE, while the money-bleeding oil companies will never loosen political pressure on nuclear industry, and while people with too much time and too little education will always find refuge in local antinuclear cults, the world IS getting more nuclear-friendly by the day.
China has a very ambitious nuclear program. US is getting back on the nuclear train after decades of political suppression. French/Japanese have done outstanding work and deserve a "thank you" from the rest of the world. OT how come we dont have any Japanese members?

[nbk2000]

We do have japanese members, just very few.

[Lewis]

Cold fusion seems to be just a fad.

If people are interested in something in the same vien of impossibility, check out Zero Point Energy. (little or no relation to Half Life 2)

At least that force has been proven to exist.