Month: June 2012

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Patenting Cold Fusion technology – Navigating Patent Office Classification – Part 2 –

The following is a further posting in a series  of articles by David French, a patent attorney with 35 years experience, which will review issues of interest touching on the field of Cold Fusion.

As a preliminary matter, I have been asked why I am doing these postings.  I have a message.  That message is: 

“Patents are a vast resource for learning about what is going on.  Read them.  Understand them.  And you will make better inventions yourself.”

The present posting continues with that objective.

In Part 1 of this posting we examined how Cold Fusion applications and patents are classified under the traditional United States patent office classification system.  Patents are also classified by another system, extensively in use in Europe and elsewhere and also used as a secondary classification system within the US patent office.  This is the system of the International Patent Classification – IPC sponsored by the World Intellectual Property Organization – WIPO in Geneva. WIPO is the same organization that operates the Patent Cooperation Treaty – PCT.

Currently, US patents are simultaneously classified both under the US classification system and under the IPC.  This has not been true in the past, but it is true today.  And through back-classification, US patents from about 1902 onwards are now also classified under the IPC. 

The IPC is an intuitively designed method for classifying inventions. The first number of the class is always a letter of the alphabet that corresponds to one of the following:

International Patent Classification 

Section A — Human Necessities

Section B — Performing Operations; Transporting

Section C — Chemistry; Metallurgy

Section D — Textiles; Paper

Section E — Fixed Constructions

Section F — Mechanical Engineering; Lighting; Heating; Weapons; Blasting

Section G — Physics

Section H — Electricity 

The section that concerns us is: G-Physics. Subsection and further subsections that concern us are: 

G21

NUCLEAR PHYSICS; NUCLEAR ENGINEERING

G21B

FUSION REACTORS (uncontrolled fusion, applications thereof G21J

 G21B 3/00

Low-temperature nuclear fusion reactors, e.g. alleged Cold Fusion reactors [8]

(enter the subclass on the IPC Home page in the left-side box under “Current symbol” to view subclass)

In the case of the IPC there is an actual category for a “low-temperature nuclear fusion reactor”.  The full classification code is: G21B 3/00.  With this code, searches for patents can be carried out in various patent offices around the world.  Here are some results for searches at the European Patent Office – EPO.

 EPO Search 

In the EPO there is a single database that includes both applications and patents.  A document that contains the letter “A” in its reference number relates to an application.  A document that contains the letter “B” in its reference number refers to an issued patent.

Searching in the EPO patent and patent application database using the IPC classification G21B3/00 (on the date of this search, May 15, 2012) as the search term produces 93 results.   Here  is the resulting list of viewable documents identified in the search.

We can carry out this search a second time combining the specific class with additional terms.  Here are the results when searching for the combination of:  “Cold Fusion” in the full text of a document and G21B3/00 as the IPC classification – 12 results found.  Here are the results of that search.

It is pretty clear from these search results that the European Patent Office is at least receiving applications that are directed to Cold Fusion related inventions.  Due to the delays in examination that can amount to 4, 5 and 6 and more years, few of these applications have issued patent.  (An issued patent has a number with B-in-a-bracket following.)  But it is often advantageous for an applicant to have the actual grant of a patent delayed.

IPC searching at the US PTO

Returning to the US patent office, searches can be done amongst pending applications and issued US patents using the IPC classification system.  Here are some of the results on the patent side, done around May 15, 2012:

USPTO Search

Results of Search in US Patent Collection db for:
ICL/G21B3/00: 31 patents.

Results of Search in US Patent Collection db for:
(ICL/G21B3/00 AND fusion): 23 patents.

Results of Search in US Patent Collection db for:
(ICL/G21B3/00 AND “Cold Fusion”): 19 patents.

Results of Search in US Patent Collection db for:
(ICL/G21B3/00 AND “excess heat”): 15 patents.

 Results of Search in US Patent Collection db for:
((ICL/G21B3/00 AND “Cold Fusion”) AND “excess heat”): 12 patents.

 The above searches were done amongst issued US patents using the IPC classification system.  Here are some of the results on the application side:

Results of Search in AppFT Database for:
ICL/G21B3/00 and “Cold Fusion” and “excess heat”:   7 applications.

And here is an actual list of pending applications that meet the above search criteria:

PUBLISHED APP. NO.                                             Title

1.  20120069945 INTERACTIONS OF CHARGED PARTICLES ON SURFACES FOR FUSION AND OTHER APPLICATIONS 

2.  20110142183 Multiring apparatus and method to measure heat released by a sample loaded with hydrogen 

3.  20100303188 Interactions of Charged Particles on Surfaces for Fusion and Other Applications 

4.  20100195780 Apparatus and process for thermal gradient-driven metal catalyzed fusion reactor 

5.  20100008461 Cold Fusion apparatus 

6.  20090122940 LOW TEMPERATURE FUSION 

7.  20080205572 Apparatus and process for generating nuclear heat 

(Hyperlink access to these applications is available here.)

While the titles provide some indication of the content of the documents, the above results do not necessarily mean that these patent applications actually address Cold Fusion.  It only means that this term or phrase was used somewhere in the document, along with “excess heat”. They have, however, been classified by a classification examiner in International Class G21B3/00.

Furthermore, even if a patent issues on any of these applications, this does not mean that a useful process for delivering unexplained excess heat has been described.  Many times examiners choose not to challenge an applicant to prove utility.  It is possible to file a patent application that is totally erroneous, and sometimes it will slip through, surprisingly, more often than not.

Additionally, if a patent application describes a process that could possibly be useful to provide excess heat through Cold Fusion, but only claims a collateral arrangement which is apparently operative, then the patent will issue.  This is because the patent is not directed to controlling the generation of heat through Cold Fusion.  Patents are classified according to what they claim.

 Where is the breakthrough patent?

 Almost certainly many other patent offices around the world have been receiving applications relating to Cold Fusion. Most of these applications will eventually be paralleled at the US Patent Office. These applications may describe a valid process, or not.  Anyone can search and review such documents once they are laid open to the public.  If anyone has filed an absolute winner patent application that describes how to make it happen, we would almost certainly know about it once 18 months have passed from the original filing date.

 Most countries in the world allow private research to be carried out notwithstanding the existence of an issued patent.  Furthermore, applications cannot be used to disrupt even full-out commercialization up to the point when a patent is granted.  Once a patent issues, compensation can be required for pre-grant use, and an injunction may issue.  But with some 150 countries around the world, it is unlikely that any person obtaining a controlling patent in the field of Cold Fusion will be able to shut-down everywhere the exploitation of the knowledge provided in a patent application that describes a working process.  This is just as true concerning Cold Fusion as it is true concerning the alleged 100 mile per gallon carburetor.

 Accordingly, there is good reason to believe that the breakthrough knowledge to solve the Cold Fusion riddle and provide the world with its stream source of energy has not been addressed in a patent filing, unless it is amongst those applications still pending in their 18 month secrecy period..

 

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REAL POPULAR COLD FUSION

Graphic: LENR beta-decay in the lattice.

LENR/LENT science is known as cold fusion in popular vernacular for many reasons. There is the well-remembered worldwide media flurry over the wondrous announcement by Pons and Fleishman in 1989; the decades long discourse exemplifying it as the fringe of fringe sciences; the repeated high-profile dirty-dealt blows to cold fusion science by established energy concerns aimed at debunking it once and for all. Even movies and sci-fi have helped put cold fusion in the public vernacular. Basically anything that is ‘less hot than the sun’ fusion, involving some sort of nuclear reaction, is cold fusion in the minds eye of the public. It’s a popular name with a nice ring to it, Cold Fusion, and it is about to become the most popular sweet source for energy.

Now the chief scientist at NASA – Langley has released a paper to help us better understand this art. It is densely written, each sentence packed with meaning. Even the title bears a closer look, REALISM and OUTLOOK.

In order to better understand the paper we can look at each part of every sentence and categorize it as the title suggests, under Realism or Outlook. It is best to list only those parts that qualify as definitive when kept in context; parts based on ‘maybe’ or ‘what if’ are not included.

Thanks are given to ‘we’ll stick to our guns’ Pons and Fleischman and to all the dedicated scientists who continued the research: now we have a fantastic science emerging as the ‘Solution to All Energetics’, through low-energy nuclear reactions.

LENR/LENT Science – popularly known as Cold Fusion.

READ NASA and VIEW THEIR VIDEO PRESENTATIONS

Low Energy Nuclear Reactions, the Realism and the Outlook (read)
by Dennis Bushnell, Chief Scientist, NASA Langley Research Center

REALISM

  • hundreds of experiments worldwide indicating heat and transmutations with minimal radiation and low energy input
  • evidence indicates something real is occurring
  • with effects occurring from using diverse materials, methods of energy addition etc
  • This is far from a “Narrow Band” set of physical phenomena
  • several labs have blown up studying LENR and windows have melted, indicating when the conditions are “right” prodigious amounts of energy can be produced and released
  • are in fact inventing (in real time) the requisite engineering, along with verifying the physics

 

OUTLOOK

  • NASA Langley, the epiphany moment on LENR was the publication of the Widom-Larsen Weak Interaction LENR Theory
  • theory indicates energy densities, some several million times chemical. The current experiments are in the 10’s to hundreds range
  • still far from the theoretical limits of the weak interaction physics for LENR performance
  • given the truly massive-to-mind boggling benefits – solutions to climate, energy and the limitations that restrict the NASA Mission areas, all of them. The key to space exploration is energetics. The key to supersonic transports and neighbor-friendly personal fly/drive air vehicles is energetics, as simplex examples of the potential implications of this area of research
  • 1% of the nickel mined on the planet each year could produce the world’s energy requirements at the order of 25% the cost of coal
  • it is worth far more resources than are currently being devoted to this research arena

 

ENTER THE COLD FUSION MARKETPLACE

http://www.blacklightpower.com

http://www,brillouinenergy.com

http://www.ecat.com

http://www.defkalion-energy.com

With NASA and many others we are able to quickly replace all major sources of energy with cold fusion. At a cost savings, both in implementation and future use, ad infinitum.

Every friend, neighbor, coworker, student, teacher, politician and activist, liberal and conservative, both young and old should become aware of this as soon as possible.

Then the harm caused from continued use of dirty crippling coal, asthma inducing oil, or birth defective radioactive nuclear becomes a matter of criminal negligence. Do all you can to both get the word out and enable this energy transition. It is the most important topic of our time.

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Too Close To The Sun: 1994 BBC doc profiles early history of “cold fusion underground”

“If it had been anything else, we would have said, ‘Oh, people don’t want us to do it, forget it, just leave it alone.’ But this is not in that category. This is interesting science, new science.

If you’ve got any integrity, you don’t give it up.” — Martin Fleischmann

Too Close to The Sun from BBC Horizon recounts the story of cold fusion from the initial announcement in 1989 through developments in 1994 when the video was released. Multiple interviews with major players include Eugene Mallove speaking on the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s bungling of cold fusion data, misrepresenting the actual creation of excess heat from their test cell by claiming they saw nothing. A later analysis by Mitchell Swartz of JET Energy revealed the blunder, though it was never corrected.

“The cold fusion episode will be looked upon as one of the greatest travesties against justice and understanding that has ever occurred in the history of science,” says Mallove.

Also profiled is Michael McKubre, whose Menlo Park lab SRI reported “up to 500 times excess heat” and Randall Mills then of Thermacore, now of Blacklight Power, “claimed 1000% excess heat” from light-water and nickel cells. At the time, that news prompted another “senior scientist at a national laboratory” to begin work on the phenomenon. In the film, that scientist remains unknown, speaking in the shadows, due to the stigma of this field and the backlash that clean cold fusion research brings.

Professor David Williams describes an early and earnest effort by Harwell Laboratory in Britain which found no effect from the experiments. He revealed his frustration on camera. “At first you assume it’s because you’re not smart enough, or not going long enough, or not doing things quite right, so you try yet more variations, and all the time all these claims are coming in from all sorts of people saying Oh they could do the first time around! You know, you feel like a right bird! Here are all these people saying they switched this cell on and bang, it works…..and we found nothing.”

Caltech commemorates perhaps their biggest scientific failure with this T-shirt.
John Huizenga was Co-Chairman of the Energy Research Advisory Board ERAB that reviewed the evidence for the U.S. Department of Energy and issued a rushed report just months after Drs. Fleischmann and Pons’ announcement that effectively barred cold fusion research from any funding for over two decades, dropping clean energy in favor of expensive hot fusion and dangerous nuclear power plants that use radioactive fuel. The Department of Energy’s current $29 billion dollar budget has $0 for developing this revolutionary science.

The ERAB panel selectively chose what evidence to allow by claiming that anything that didn’t fit their conventional theory of nuclear science was impossible. “We wrote a very negative report and concluded that the results that were being presented to us were contrary to everything we had found out about nuclear physics over the last fifty years”, Huizenga said.

He authored the book Cold Fusion: The Scientific Fiasco of the Century claiming an untruth that defined the misinformation campaign’s motto to this day: “There’s no experimental evidence at this point that any nuclear reaction products have been formed. Therefore the claim that cold fusion is a nuclear reaction process without a commensurate amount of nuclear reaction products is simply pathological science.”

Though he attended several cold fusion conferences, and eventually went to a lab with a working cell at Cal Poly Pomona where Professors Robert Bush and Robert Eagleton were researching the effect, Huizenga refused to look at the data showing excess heat, first claiming he was “retired”. Then, after an invitation to stay a while and examine the cell with all his newly freed time, he hemmed, saying he had some “consulting” work to do.

Selectively ignoring data was rampant among the so-called “objective” science community. John Maddox, editor of science journal Nature had decided one year later that cold fusion was over. “I think it will turn out, after two, three years more investigation, that this is just spurious and just unconnected with anything that you would call nuclear fusion. I think that broadly speaking it is dead and it will remain dead for a very long time.”

Speaking on those early days in the U.S., when members’ vitriol stained the American Physical Society, Stanley Pons recalls, “You forget things in time. I can remember that was extremely bitter at that time. I thought we’d been treated extremely unjustly, which I still do. I think the critics were not operating in the bounds of sanity, and I think we were victimized in that respect. So I was quite bitter at the time and I’ve just chose to ignore it and just go on. I really don’t have any feelings about it anymore; it’s just a non-issue now.

“I think you become numb,” added Martin Fleischmann.

“You become numb to it, yeah.”

Keiji Kunimatsu, a former student of Martin Fleischmann persuaded Minoru Toyota, of the famed Toyoto car corporation, to fund the pair’s research, setting them up in a lab in the south of France near Nice. Toyota had already been learning about what cold fusion was. Kunimatsu had learned from Fleischmann that “Scientists must do something new which nobody has done before. That way is the spirit of science.”

Fleischman said, “It was a relief to get away from the terrible atmosphere in the United States and to have the opportunity to work totally without public attention for a period of time.”

Although reproducibility of this mercurial reaction continues to plague many labs to this day, a handful of researchers have made huge advances; a few to the point of developing a commercial technology. For these few labs, the clean energy of cold fusion is available on-demand: turn it on when you want, turn it off when you want. When the engineering of these devices finally produces a product, the over two decades of smug pontifications of an errant orthodoxy by the conventional scientific community will at last end.

In 1993, twenty Japanese corporations including Toyota, Hitachi, and Mitsubishi, financed the New Hydrogen Energy Laboratory for a five-year program called Icarus. Martin Fleischmann consulted on the new project.

In celebration of the inauguration of this project, he toasted “To Icarus One, and all the other Icarus’s to follow. And don’t forget, our wings are stuck on with superglue.”

Early T-shirt design by Al Kemme and Associates reveals greater truth.

Thank you Martin Fleischmann.
Thank you Stanley Pons.
Thank you Eugene Mallove.

Thanks to you, we will have Cold Fusion Now!

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1994 Cold Fusion Sourcebook dedicated to “Children of Chernobyl”

The Salt Lake City, Utah Fusion Information Center founded by Hal Fox was the first research center dedicated to researching and publishing about cold fusion. Newsletters such as Fusion Facts, the New Energy News, and Journal of New Energy all emanated from this organization beginning in mid-1989 and running through 1999.

Hal Fox speaks at Conference on Future Energy
Hal Fox was the director of the first research laboratory at the University of Utah Research Park. Realizing the benefits of this new form of energy, he became a strong advocate, creating several companies and organizing many publication efforts to advance the field. The Cold Fusion Sourcebook edited by Hal Fox coalesced The Proceedings of the International Symposium on Cold Fusion and Advanced Energy Sources held in Belarus, Minsk May 24-26, 1994.

The book is dedicated to three classes of people:

1. To those international scientists, engineers, and inventors that have diligently pursued the truth; who have trusted the integrity of other scientists who reported on their new discoveries; who have replicated, and improved, and, in turn, reported on this new science of cold nuclear fusion and other enhanced energy devices.

2. To the new scientists, engineers, inventors, and scholars who now can follow in the footsteps of those who have led, and become leaders of others. You will be the individuals and the generation who will develop, install, and use the new non-polluting, inexpensive energy systems that will help improve our homes, our countries, and our world.

3. To the Children of Chernobyl.

Cold Fusion Sourcebook edited by Hal Fox [download .pdf]
from New Energy Times

Fox’s Introduction follows here:

“When I first learned of the devastation to Belarus (and parts of the Ukraine) from the Chernobyl nuclear power plant disaster, I was strongly distressed at the intense penalty that was imposed upon the nation, its people, and especially its children. I determined to do something for the last “Children of Chernobyl”. I desire to express my commendations to those who risked their lives to tell the world about the silent killer in their land and all of us express our thanks to the concerned citizens from many nations that are trying to help. There is no nation on earth that is in a better location for the international conference on new energy than Belarus. There is no nation on earth that deserves and needs a new non-polluting source of energy more than Belarus. That is why I am here with you at this conference.”

“I’m pleased to be the editor of the English version of the proceedings of this important international conference early this year I want to over 50 cold fusion scientists whom I call my friends, and asked them to provide reports on their work. Each one was asked to write an article which would become part of a “Cold Fusion Source book”. In addition, my friend Ben Filimonov of Belarus invited papers from leading scientists from his part of the world who had been successful in the development of this exciting new technology of cold nuclear fusion. With the help of excellent translators, especially Ms. Tamara Grinevich, those papers, mainly from CIS (Commonwealth of Independent States), have been included in this publication. In addition, we have also included some invited papers that deal with some other enhanced energy systems (new energy systems that provide more energy out then used as input or driving energy).”

“The first article in the Cold Fusion Sourcebook is mine and is meant to set the stage with the articles that follow by providing a review of the many new methods, in addition to the original Pons-Fleischmann cold fusion cells, by which nuclear reactions and/or excess thermal energy can be produced in relatively simple “table-top” experiments. The second paper is by Dr. Ben Filimonov, who categorizes the many phenomenon of cold nuclear fusion and provides us with a new way of looking at this rich phenomenon.”

“To the attendees of this conference and those who read our work: we challenge you to make use of this knowledge, improve what we have done, and solve the energy problems so that there will never again be anymore “children of Chernobyl”.
–Hal Fox Introduction Cold Fusion Source Book 1994

Chorus: Will we ever learn?

Courageous new energy scientists continue the effort to develop clean energy technology from cold fusion as our planet is again threatened with the horrific damage of radioactive poisoning that alters the genetic code for generations. Along with pollution from fossil fuels devastating our world wildlife and biodiversity, and war and terror rampant in our streets, there is little more important than working for change in our arrangement for living and peace on planet Earth.

Talk to your friends, family, educators, and legislators about clean energy from the hydrogen in water, and demand

Cold Fusion Now!

Chernobyl Legacy by Paul Fusco [watch] will be disturbing.

Interview with a “Liquidator” from Chernobyl and Eastern Europe [read]

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EVOLUTION THROUGH COLD FUSION

A New Era 

With popular cold fusion – LENR/LENT science we are on the verge of an epic technological advancement. Always there are concurrent personal, social, economic, spiritual, and philosophical advancements, our evolution as a species.

Our strong survival instinct is now evolving to include each of each other, and all life on the planet, as a whole.

Sociobiology is the instinctual relationship of a species with both it’s environment and with members of it’s own species. It is theorized that humanity evolved (and is evolving) along lines of empathy and compassion as the strength of cultures that propagate successfully, our own survival of the fittest. Instinct in a species evolves as the species does.

As humanity’s instincts evolve we gain further insight. We observe interactions amongst ourselves, our universe, and its many components. We gain deeper understanding of cause and effect, it’s benefits and detriments both within and around us. Our sociobiology then evolves.

Back in the far distant past our instinctual fear of fire warned us away, we ran like all other creatures. Over time we cautiously captured embers when fearful raging fires had passed. We learned to utilize and then create fire. This was an epic technological advancement. Our instinct had changed and we entered the Fire Era, a major step in our evolution.

With technological advancements we then harnessed fire for metallurgy, motion, work, and the generation of electricity. As coal, liquid, gaseous, and radioactive fuels delivered more electricity, work, and motion, modern civilization experienced a surge in personal, social, economic, spiritual, and philosophical advancements. Humanity has evolved quite a bit since the dawning of the Fire Era. Concepts of the right to well-being have grown. Humanity is slowly becoming more humane.

We are now entering the Transmutation Era. We will have unlimited, nearly free, easily available, dense, and non-polluting energy from the transmutation of elements. With excitation, the harmonic convergence of atomic particles within the lattice ensures the cold fusion LENR/LENT nuclear active phenomenon. This is an epic technological advancement; which is sure to further our evolution as a species.

A Theory of Evolution through Cold Fusion

Our strong survival instinct is evolving to encompass each of each other, and all life on the planet, as a whole. In the past century our understanding of the biosphere and the importance of environmental stewardship has grown exponentially. Concepts of nonviolence and peace have progressed. Life’s collective right to well-being is better understood. Cold fusion/LENR/LENT technology will empower this change in our species; we will evolve to be harmonic with both our biosphere and our neighbors.

As humanity moves into space we will consider the guaranteed right to sustenance and nutriment; with food, air, water, lodging, and health care ensured for any citizen who migrates to Mars or other space colonies. These concepts will then gain hold on Earth.

Our concept of what constitutes “profit” will also evolve. Humanity will have a galactic mentality with goals beyond the monetary based “profit motive”. Economic models will evolve to reflect this. Sustainable economic generosity created through the continuous resource of energy at point of use for the health of community; economy experienced as the word’s Ancient Greek roots imply: οἰκονομία (oikonomia, “management of a household, administration”) from οἶκος (oikos, “house”) + νόμος (nomos, “custom” or “law”), hence “rules of the house(hold)”.  Maximizing the profit of mutual well-being will be the new measure of success.

The dawning of the Fire Era seems like eons ago. We’ve come a long way. Evolution seems inevitable. If the past has anything to show us, humanity is inevitably transmuting into an empathic civilization.

Evolution Through Cold Fusion – Greg Goble

“The fact of evolution is the backbone of biology, and biology is thus in the peculiar position of being a science founded on an improved theory, is it then a science or faith?”- Charles Darwin

“We have to do the best we can. This is our sacred human responsibility.” – Albert Einstein

“In the long history of humankind (and animal kind, too) those who learned to collaborate and improvise most effectively have prevailed.” – Charles Darwin

“Only a life lived for others is a life worthwhile.” – Albert Einstein

“Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, and not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science” – Charles Darwin

“Those instrumental goods which should serve to maintain the life and health of all human beings should be produced by the least possible labor of all.” – Albert Einstein

“The very essence of instinct is that it’s followed independently of reason.”- Charles Darwin

“Where there is love there is no question.” – Albert Einstein

“A human being is part of the whole… universe… ” source

To learn some of the science behind this theory please view “The Empathic Civilization” by Jeremy Rifkin.

Evolution (muse)

Once again, in wonder a child whistles a refrain while sitting on a hill under the shade of a tree. From above a bird on a branch tilts its head and once again joyfully warbles its response.

On a distant mountain a youth walks alone towards the high peaks. Arrives reflective of humanity, life, and wondering a part to play. A vision unfolds of all that has been and of what can be. Then returns to walk a path praying for the best for all thru-out time.

Elsewhere, an elder experiences the fruition of a hearts dream that has taken years to bring to success.

Others watch and inspiration blossoms deep within.

It’s no wonder my mind wanders in awe of it all…

Not so far in the distant future, the next generation will look back at our
generation as the last of the “fire era” and know that the term “energy shortage”
was a term for un-enlightened minds.-gbgoble2009

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