1973 Nobel laureate Dr. Brian Josephson responded to the April 3 New York Times letter Invitation to a Dialogue: Action on the Climate by Robert W. Fri asking for social scientists to become more engaged in promoting low-cost energy alternatives.
Read 2011 report on the topic: Beyond Technology: Strengthening Energy Policy Through Social Science [.pdf]
Josephson’s letter answered with the solution offered by low-energy nuclear reactions (LENR) and it did not appear with the other responses published in the Sunday Dialogue, so we post it here:
For publication
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Robert W. Fri (Apr. 3rd.) asks, in regard to climate change, for ‘steps that will make useful progress at low cost’. I suggest his committee look carefully into so-called cold fusion, a good source for which is the Library at lenr.org. (corrected from lenr.com)
In retrospect the conventional view, that the claims of Fleischmann and Pons in this regard were erroneous, can be seen to have been based on a number of faulty assumptions, some of which were discussed in a lecture by Peter Hagelstein at MIT (see http://www.infinite-energy.com/images/pdfs/VernerIAP2013.pdf). The claim that in such systems heat is generated far in excess of what can be explained in conventional terms has by now been confirmed in very many investigations, though reproducibility on demand has been a problem. The factors determining how much heat will be generated in any given sample are at present poorly understood; thus modest funding to address these issues should pay dividends. Once these factors are understood, there is a real possibility that fusion processes at ordinary temperatures in suitable materials can contribute significantly to energy resources in the future, and thereby help to combat the problem of climate change.
Prof. Brian Josephson
Emeritus Professor of Physics, University of Cambridge
Foreign Honorary Member, American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Cold Fusion Now asks all readers to respond in writing, by phone, or in person, to their local media and political offices whenever alternatives are put forth that ignore the cold fusion solution.
He doesn’t expect steam from cold fusion to be able to power the vehicle directly, but electricity generated from the steam would “trickle-charge” a battery to operate the vehicle.
Can he do it?
For twenty-four years, Dr. Cravens has been experimenting with the anomalous heat effect (AHE), and in that time, he has focused attention on gathering criteria and methods to initiate and trigger excess power.
Heat, pressure, current, radio-frequency, chemical, laser, acoustic, magnetic field – all were investigated by Cravens and longtime research partner Dennis Letts.
Cravens presented Factors Affecting The Success Rate of Heat Generation In CF Cells at ICCF-4 in Maui 1993, and together Cravens and Letts presented The Enabling Criteria of Electrochemical Heat: Beyond Reasonable Doubt at ICCF-10 in 2003, both works referring to palladium-deuterium Pd-D systems.
But it was investigating the various triggering methods that the collaborators made a surprising discovery.
Excess heat can be triggered by radio frequency.RF-triggered excess heat experiments had been ongoing since 1992, and Letts’ collaborations with R. Sundaresan, Z. Minevski, and J.O’M. Bockris, the Texas A&M chemistry professor who nearly lost his job because of his research into cold fusion, were presented at ICCF-4.
Radio frequencies stimulated the reaction, but as usual with cold fusion, “it was difficult to reproduce”.
In Letts, D. and Cravens D. Laser Stimulation of Deuterated Palladium: Past And Present, PowerPoint slides presented at ICCF-10 2003, the authors describe one early experiment designed to test the effect of RF radio frequencies on excess power.
A standard palladium-deuterium Pd-D electrolytic cell was modified to use the more-economical gold metal as an anode, instead of platinum.
During electrolysis, the gold dissolved into the solution, settling on the surface of the palladium cathode, and ruining the experiment.
A pocket laser pointer, emitting the familiar red-light at 670 nanometers, was directed at the cathode, just to see what would happen.
The cell temperature of the 75-gram electrolyte “rose several degrees, in a short time”.
In fact, a 3-degree increase in the electrolyte suggested that the 1 milliWatt laser pointer initiated heat in excess of 500 milliWatts.
An afterthought of directing laser-light on the cathode saved an experiment.
Graph annotations by Ruby Carat.
In subsequent experiments, other frequencies were found to initiate a thermal effect, at 681 and 685 nm. “Most of the time this results in triggering a thermal response 10-30 times larger than the thermal output of the laser.” —Laser Stimulation of Deuterated Palladium Past and Present
The keywords there are not “10-30 times laser power”, but “most of the time”. Like RF, the laser triggering method did not guarantee 100% reproducibility.
However, one successful laser-triggered experiment ran live at ICCF-10.
After days of loading, a 681 nm laser irradiated a 1mm spot on the cathode of demo cell #602; excess power jumped immediately. The laser was turned off, and excess power decreased. Power to the cell was 500 mW, and with a 30 mW laser stimulation, 500 mW excess power was generated.
Demo cell 602 excess power graph
Laser stimulation to initiate anomalous heat reflects the criteria that many researchers find critical: dynamic conditions must exist in the chamber. Energetics’ Technologies used Superwaves, Brillouin Energy uses Q-pulses, and even nickel-hydrogen Ni-H systems produce higher thermal power output when the chamber is heated.
Resonance by laser-light was further studied by Cravens and Letts with Peter Hagelstein, when two lasers were operated together to mix optical frequencies, creating beats to stimulate phonons in the Pd-D lattice that would initiate the reaction. Excess heat was associated with beat frequencies at 8.3 and 15.3 THz and 20.4 THz.
In addition, the size of the active regions was also compared to the laser’s region of impact. From their paper, it appears that the Nuclear Active Environment (NAE) is “larger than the laser spot in previous single laser experiments.”
While these undertakings describe basic science research, Cravens is no stranger to commercial efforts.
Representing ENECO, an early new-energy company initially formed to develop the Fleischmann-Pons work, Cravens was hired to provide an independent evaluation of the Patterson Power Cell, a proto-type commercial thermal generator designed by James Patterson of Clean Energy Technologies, Inc. (CETI) that utilized “plastic microspheres” layered with transition metals. Cravens reported on this investigation in Flowing Electrolyte Calorimetry at ICCF-5 in 1995.
Attendees at that conference were also treated to a live demonstration of the Patterson Power Cell. Here’s what Hal Fox of the New Energy Institute and publisher of Fusion Facts wrote in April of that year:
BEHIND THE SCENES AT ICCF-5 by Hal Fox
One of the most impressive presentations at the ICCF-5 was
given by Dr. Dennis Cravens and supported by a working
cold fusion cell set up in the foyer by Clean Energy
Technologies, Inc. (CETI) of Dallas Texas. Attendees at the
conference could take their own data, compute the results,
and show that a cold fusion cell was operating at 200 to 400
percent excess thermal power. This cold fusion system
utilized the patented inventions of James A. Patterson. This
invention consists of small plastic beads coated with copper,
nickel, and palladium. These beads provide a uniform large
surface area (of either palladium or nickel) to catalyze the
nuclear processes that are the heart of cold fusion
phenomena. The CETI patents cover both light and heavy
water electrolysis using the metal-coated microspheres.
Patterson’s company, Clean Energy Technologies, Inc. (CETI), got together with Dennis Cravens and brought to the conference a demonstration cell in a flow calorimeter. It worked spectacularly well. Cravens [2] discussed it on the first day. The device output 3 to 5 times input energy, ignoring energy lost to electrolysis gases, and as much as 10 times input if you include various factors such as electrolysis gases and the heat lost from the cell container.
As a demo, the Patterson cell output power was only a few Watts, but the durability was impressive. Rothwell continued:
The CETI demo system is fairly predictable, well controlled, and well-behaved, although it did get a bit quirky in the harsh conditions of the ICCF5 hallway. During breaks, the hotel coffee pots kept tripping the circuit breakers. This sent jolts of power through the transformer, which crashed the experiment. The CF reaction started up again every time, usually in about 10 minutes. The high precision flowmeter unfortunately did not survive the beating; the batteries and power supplies in it burned up. Fortunately, the low-precision flowmeter—a 10-ml laboratory supply graduated glass cylinder plus stopwatch—cannot be affected by power outages and excess voltage. The experiment was subjected to other abuses: the cart holding the experiment was wheeled up to a hotel room every night, carried on elevators, and pushed around. Cravens even lifted the cell from its container to show it to people while it was running! Yet in spite of this, the reaction started up in the morning after 10 or 20 minutes of electrolysis, although on the last day it took about a half hour, and the power was turned up higher than before. The fact that the cell survived this treatment at all demonstrates that this is one of the most robust and practical electrochemical CF systems yet developed.
Unfortunately, when Patterson’s beads ran out, the next batch didn’t work; the mystery of cold fusion had claimed another honest effort.
Yet the work of Dennis Cravens has persisted, and in his latest project, powering a 1928 Model-A with cold fusion, the aesthetic of a longtime researcher in anomalous effects marries the old with the new. Why?
“It is bold. It is daring. It is crazy but I have to try,” he writes.
Want to participate in something truly extraordinary? Go to Dennis Craven‘s Cold Fusion Powered Car Part 2 before April 20 to contribute.
The quote on his page says it best:
You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.
—Dr. Martin Luther King
New energy advocates rallied behind George Miley‘s LENUCO at the Future Energy site, but it wasn’t enough to put the LENR-Gen module project over the top to win the chance to speak before venture capital firms at a Boston, Massachusetts event.
In the lead for most of the ten-day “crowdvoting” contest, LENUCO slipped to third by the last day, while SmartPwrGrid and Printable Photovoltaics took first and second place with a surge of votes.
The projects page is gone now, but at my last check all vote counts were under 1000, though SmartPwrGrid was approaching that mark fast.
During the last day, a reader found evidence of vote-buying from at least one of the contestants which, according to the organizers, disqualifies them. The two winners are not implicated in that vote-buying scheme.
That the LENR community couldn’t muster 1000 votes shows the need for further outreach.
Whatever the feeling, the fact that a revolutionary solution to our energy, environmental, and economic problems is forced to submit to “crowdvoting” to be heard reveals the absurdity of our societal priorities at the close of the Chemical Age.
A Game-Changing Power Source Based on Low Energy Nuclear Reactions (LENRs).pdf presented at last year’s NETS conference shows the beginnings of this current LENR-Gen module.
University students work on similar LENR experiments under Dr. Miley’s instruction.Researching both excess heat and transmutations has been the focus of Miley’s works for decades, and has involved students throughout.
Helping a new generation of scientists is well-worth the funding this technology deserves, and we will continue to support the efforts of labs who struggle to bring a clean energy future forward.
The LENR Distributed Power Units project up on the Future Energy “crowdvoting” platform is the favorite with just hours to go, though the Printable Photovoltaics is still hanging on for a last minute surge.
George Miley is Professor Emeritus of University of Chicago Urbana-Champagne, Illinois, and the intellect behind LENUCO and the LENR-Gen unit.
He describes the “core technology” presented in a statement on the front page:
1.25 grams of nickel can make energy like 5 barrels of oilLENR Power Units use pressurized hydrogen –nickel nanoparticles undergoing low energy nuclear reactions to create a very high energy density heat source configured for co-generation power for home or industrial distributed power –George Miley LENR Distributed Power Units
That means that tiny particles of nickel – the very same nickel in your pocket as change – are exposed to hydrogen H, the simplest element in the universe, and found in water.
In a small chamber that has a higher-pressure than normal, the hydrogen interacts with the nickel atoms to make heat.
At the NETS conference last year, Miley presented a design for a LENR generator that could replace the dirty radioactive fuel currently used by NASA for spacecraft power in the General Purpose Heat Source with clean nickel and hydrogen heat source.
The heat is closer in magnitude to Einstein’s E = mc2 energy than it is to burning hydrocarbons, and a lot cleaner.
Mass changing to energy is a nuclear phenomenon, not a chemical phenomenon, but no radioactive materials are used.
A reaction based on the metal nickel and hydrogen, there is no dangerous radiation from the LENUCO power unit.
This source of this heat power is called the new fire.
While the current handful of startups around the world is almost wholly focused on hot-water heaters, LENUCO plans to make electricity with this device.
The smaller 10K units would be for civilian use, though a military customer is in the plan as well:
The recent discovery of practical applications of low energy nuclear reactions (LENR) has created much activity and interest worldwide. Several companies, including LENUCO, have entered this business. Our approach using hydrogen loaded nanoparticles to produce heat that is converted to electrical output offers many advantages. Lenuco was founded to commercialize this technology and has a two-pronged business model. One prong is to manufacture small to medium range distributed power sources for home and industrial use.
The second prong is to provide develop the technology for use by in Army bases, both homeland and in forward facilities, for a main power source.
Both uses capitalize on the high power density and low maintenance, radiation free, long lifetime characteristics of LENR power cells.
University students work on similar LENR experiments under Dr. Miley’s instruction.LENUCO’s LENR power source is a revolutionary new technology based on high pressure hydrogen loading of nickel-alloy based nanoparticles.
Heat is produced by the resulting low energy nuclear reactions through a process which avoids any significant radioactivity.
Uses range from home heating to central heating units.
Compared to other renewable energy, LENR power units offer two distinct advantages: 24/7 operation and higher power density, hence significantly smaller units per unit power.
LENR cells also provide power without greenhouse emissions and with no significant wastes.
These advantages plus minimum maintenance and long lifetime result in a distinct economic advantage over other renewable energy sources as reflected by shorter pay-back times than solar, wind or fuel cells. –George Miley LENR Distributed Power Units
George Miley‘s LENUCO company is vying for a chance to speak and “pitch” for funding to develop the LENR-Gen module, this time, from private investment representatives.
LENR-Gen modules are, according to Miley, “LENR Power Units [that] use pressurized hydrogen–nickel nanoparticles undergoing low energy nuclear reactions to create a very high energy density heat source configured for co-generation power for home or industrial distributed power.”
Then check for confirmation email so your vote counts. Didn’t get it? Check your Junk (Spam) folder.
Voting ends March 15.
From the website’s http://futureenergy.ultralightstartups.com/pages/timeline: To participate in the Future Energy Pitching Event at MIT on April 4, 2013, companies must apply for consideration. Future Energy is opening the selection process to the public and the energy community through a crowdvoting contest. The two startups that receive the most votes during the crowdvoting contest will receive automatic bids to present at the Future Energy event at MIT on April 4, 2013.
March 1: Crowd Voting Opens
Future Energy will pre-select startups to take part in the crowdvoting contest
Pre-selected startups will be invited to create profiles on the Future Energy crowdvoting platform. Sign In Here
Voting and rating opens to the public
March 6: Pitching Application Closes
Last day to apply to pitch at the April 4 Future Energy event at MIT.
Click here to apply to pitch at other Future Energy events
March 15: Crowd Voting Contest Ends
The startups with the most votes will be announced. These companies will be guaranteed two of the eight pitching spots at the Future Energy Pitching Event at MIT on April 4, 2013.
ARPA-E has failed its claimed mission to support experimental research on new energy, and now forces scientists to get crowdfunding votes. U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu recently stepped down, choosing not to serve a second term.
Cold Fusion Now expects ARPA-E Director Arun Majumdar to fund LENR research, or do the same.
Cold Fusion Now is en route to the San Jose Film Festival screening of The Believers, a new cold fusion documentary from 137 Films.
The 80-minute sample of cold fusion history focuses on the aftermath of the March 23, 1989 announcement of cold fusion by Drs. Martin Fleischmann and Stanley Pons. Video of Martin Fleischmann in declining health makes for an emotionally-tough portrait.
Cold Fusion Now will offer free goodies to patrons after the Friday night show as antidote to anguish.
But there’s plenty of sunshine to spread all the way to San Jose.
I posted up a calendar on their bulletin board for all the spaceship engineers to see at lunch.
It was a crowded spot, but you can sure see it, and plenty of people pass by on their way to the restaurant overlooking the runway.
Rolling over to Scaled Composites, I dropped off a handful of calendars for the designers of SpaceShipOne and Two.
The Secretary at the Front Desk really dug all the info packed into each page.
I took a picture of the calendar in front of their X-prize that commands the lobby.
I had to sigh, if only there was an X-prize for new energy…
Then I slid over to Xcor, a small, independent company making their own spaceship – “the whole thing”, said the young engineer who answered the door. I said cold fusion promises a clean, dense, power solution, though no technology is available just yet.
Showing him the pictures of cold fusion cells, he said “I need a power plant – not two guys with a test-tube!”
I had to laugh at that one, and told him “it’s in the works…”
Driving cross the port to BAE Systems, I saw for the first time the big, new hangar for Virgin Galactic. It was almost like spotting a used bookstore from the road – I made a beeline to their facility.
Walking through the lobby doors, I had to remember that I was walking through the doors of a commercial space enterprise – with real spaceships – for people!
“Hi, I do clean energy advocacy for cold fusion and wanted to drop off a few calendars for your engineering team,” I said to the woman at the Virgin Galactic Front Desk.
“Well thank you, nobody ever gives us calendars!” she kindly replied.
I sure was happy to break the mold.
“Are you an engineer?” I asked a young man standing around watching our exchange.
“Uh, I’m one of ’em,” he said.
“Here, have a calendar!”
He started paging through the “facts, fotos, and fun” right away!
I wasn’t allowed to take photos of the place, only the lobby backdrop. I was so excited, I forgot to ask about the graphics, but that sure looks like a WhiteKnight to me.
I pulled out of Mojave satisfied that cold fusion will be on the lips of at least a few engineers tonite – one way or another, and they’ve got a handy reference too. I’ll look forward to stopping in again on my way back down to Los Angeles in another week or two.
Will the calendar on the bulletin board still be there? How many were recycled? How many were ridiculed? How many inspired?
Hey Mojave, hope you dig it, and check out George Miley‘s GPHS designed to replace RTGs as presented in Session 462 Advanced Concepts at the NETS last year.
