Guest post by Ric Werme
Today is the customer test of Andrea Rossi’s 1 MW fusion reactor in his facility in Bologna, Italy. While Rossi initially expected to provide streaming video of the test, the customer nixed that because they didn’t want their people on a public video. (The customer has still not been identified.) Rossi also promised hourly updates during the test, but that didn’t happen, nor did I expect it too. In any major customer attending test, you just don’t take time off for that – the customer is far more important today than is the rest of the world!
I did promise in Tips & Notes to create this post this evening to provide a discussion forum, and a few details have made it out to warrant this post.
Bottom line – the customer will buy the reactor. The only thing that looks like a data point is that it was producing 470kW with zero heating power in (self-sustain mode). Given that one metric for a successful test was to produce at least 6X the input power, it certainly passes that test!
Rossi did get one blog post up (edited to convert all-caps to proper-caps and fix an obvious typo):
Andrea Rossi
October <28th, 2011 at 10:37 AM
First information regarding the 1 MW plant test:
We started regularly the test this morning . Everything is going well so far. The 1 MW E-Cat is working in self sustaining.
Tonight I will publish the non secret report that the customer will release.
Warm regards, I have to return to the plant. Sorry, I cannot answer to the many comments I am receiving. I will publish them probably I will never find the time to answer.
Warmest regards to all,
Andrea Rossi
That’s pretty much all there is from Italy so far. I don’t know if people measured 1 MW in powered mode, I assume somewhat more information will be released later this evening.
The naysayers are going strong, with comments like suggesting the customers consultants are in on the scam, and many calls to denounce the secrecy behind this test. Hey guys, this is a sales test, not a public event.
Even Jed Rothwell is upset:
[Vo]:Dismaying rumors about October 28 test
Jed Rothwell Fri, 28 Oct 2011 11:34:00 -0700
I have heard that observers of today’s tests are only being allowed to look at the equipment for a few minutes at a time, and they are not being introduced to the engineers who are taking the data. They are not being given a chance to establish the bona fides of these engineers, or to confirm that they are fully independent from Rossi.
If this is true then it goes without saying these results will have zero credibility.
If this is true then Rossi has once again taken a golden opportunity to convince the world his claims are true, and used it to make himself look like a crook.
I hope this is not true.
Whatever happens, I am sure we will get the full story. The reporters there can be relied upon to tell us the truth. If they are not allowed to interview the engineers and they cannot independently confirm the data, they will say so. I am sure Rossi knows they will tell the truth, so it seems unlikely he would impose such outrageous conditions. Unfortunately, he has often done outrageous things, such as telling people they are not allowed to measure the temperature with their own instruments.
– Jed
I’ll update this later tonight. In the meantime, discuss away, but please keep in mind this was not a science demonstration, not a public demonstration, but a step along the path to the first sale.
Also, keep in mind what this isn’t – it’s not an efficient electrical power system. The output is hot water or low pressure steam. While that can be turned into electricity, thermodynamics says it can’t be very efficient. There are plenty of applications for this sort of process heat, and that makes a fine initial target market.
Other sources of information include:
http://peswiki.com/index.php/News:October_28%2C_2011_Test_of_the_One_Megawatt_E-Cat
Sterling Allan from PES is on site.
http://www.e-catworld.com/2011/10/e-day-thread-rossis-1-mw-e-cat-plant-tested-by-first-customer/
One of the first independent blogs on the E-Cat.
http://www.journal-of-nuclear-physics.com/?p=516#comments
This is Rossi’s blog, where he expected to post hourly updates. He approves posts there, and he’s been too busy to do that.
Updates
Here are links to reports from two people who were observed the test:
Sterling D. Allan (who was present), with Hank Mills from Pure Energy Systems News reported:
It ran for 5.5 hours producing 470 kW, while in self-looped mode. That means no substantial external energy was required to make it run, because it kept itself running, even while producing an excess of nearly half a megawatt. Rossi explained the reasons for this in the presentation he gave, which I videotaped and will be posting later.
Early in the day with a glitch showing up, Rossi said that they had to make a decision about whether to go for 1 MW output, not in self-sustain mode, or with self-sustain mode at a lower power level. The customer opted to go for the self-sustain mode.
Mats Lewan of NyTeknik reported:
According to the customer’s controller, Domenico Fioravanti, the plant released 2,635 kWh during five and a half hours of self sustained mode, which is equivalent to an average power of 479 kilowatts – just under half the promised power of one megawatt.
Rossi explained this with the customer’s priority to achieve self sustained mode, which supposedly makes the process more difficult to control than when electrical power is supplied to support the reaction.
“We had to decrease the power during self sustained mode as the temperature rose too much”, Rossi said after the test.
UPDATE: I’ve allowed Ric Werme to post articles on this, with trepidation (as he noted in his first and second article on it), on the outside chance that there’s something of value here. I wrote in the first article:
Foreword: I gave Ric Werme permission to do this essay. I don’t have any doubt that the original Cold Fusion research was seriously flawed. That said, this recent new development using a different process is getting some interest, so let’s approach it skeptically to see what merit it has, if any. – Anthony
After learning of some background on the inventor (which I wasn’t aware of before today h/t to Lubos)I have very large doubts now. While Wikipedia isn’t the best reference, if there wasn’t some truth here in this reference, I expect it would be removed as libelous:
Petroldragon was an environmental technology company, which through the 90’s aimed to develop oil, coal, and gas from organic waste. It was founded by, and used patents of Andrea Rossi, and Sergio Focardi. In the late 90’s the company was found guilty of dumping environmental toxins, as well as tax fraud. Its assets were seized. [1]
News of the Rossi procedure, patented in Italy, was reported by major newspapers. Jimmy Carter showed his interest in the technology, and offered Rossi a permanent entry visa to the United States.[1] After ten months’ work and a financial investment of half a billion Lire, Petroldragon had a facility that produced twenty tons of fuel oil a day, transforming one hundred tons of organic waste.
In 1993, the company created the Petroldragon Formula 3 racing team – racecars powered by waste-derived fuel that were able to compete with cars powered by the most common petroleum products.
In the late 90’s the company was found guilty of dumping environmental toxins, as well as tax fraud. Its assets were seized, as well as Rossi’s personal assets, and Rossi was arrested and imprisoned.
The track record of the man (combined with the current cloak of secrecy) suggests that this may very well be a scam. Unless there’s some open access and independent documentation of success, I’m going to prohibit any further articles. As I’ve said in comments, we try out ideas here. Based on what I know now, I think this one needs to be put aside as unworkable, and very possibly a scam until such time it is proven. When/if it is proven as scam or factual, we’ll have another report. -Anthony
Update by Ric:
I told Anthony I’d pull some stuff together looking at the allegations in better detail. It appears the only decent source of information is from a web site Rossi created a couple years ago to address the Petroldragon saga. The events in question mostly occurred before the Internet, so there isn’t as much out there as I thought. If you believe Rossi stuck Italy with huge amount of abandoned waste, you won’t believe Rossi’s explanation. If any Italian readers can comment on the events from their memory, please do.
Rossi’s web site is http://ingandrearossi.com/ . While there is an English translation there, a better one is at Steve Krivit’s http://newenergytimes.com/v2/sr/RossiECat/RossiPetroldragonStory.shtml
A timeline seems to be the best way to summarize things:
1971 to 1996: Created Dragon, a division of his family’s business and
manufactured waste incineration and smoke purification plants.
1978: Awarded patent for a process to convert organic waste material to oil.
Started Petroldragon to commercialize it.
198?: US President Jimmy Carter offered Rossi a permanent entry visa to the
United States to develop the process in the US.
1990 (this year doesn’t make sense): Bought Omar Refinery to process oil from Petroldragon into products for
sale.
1987: Raw materials for Petroldragon had been considered “secondary refuse matter” They were reclassified “toxic waste” as were all products derived from them. “In a very short time, all equipment was sequestered. The government then determined that tanks used for storing incoming raw materials were illegal dumps of toxic waste.”
“What followed was Rossi’s arrest and imprisonment, without any possibility to save the companies. The massive media smear campaign was successful in suddenly wiping out companies whose brand value was estimated at 50 billion lire (around 30-35 million USD in 1987) and which employed 150 people.”
The saga continues on with references to infringing on petroleum based producers and crime organizations entering the waste management business.
He continues “In the past 17 years, Rossi has been in 56 trials, forcing him into deep debt because of the financial disaster, and it is still not completely paid off.
Of all 56 prosecutions, the ones which led to imprisonment ended with acquittals; only 5 of the prosecutions for tax crime ended with convictions (with some custody imprisonments). All of the other prosecutions ended with acquittal or for statute of limitation. The same Petroldragon and Omar customers, even those who suffered factory seizures or prosecutions because of involvement with Rossi’s companies, testified as witnesses in favor of the defendant.” (The customers had products derived from “toxic waste” and those without waste handling permits were now in violation of the 1987 law.)
2000: During a journey back to Italy from the U.S., when he landing at Rome airport, he was served an arrest warrant for bankruptcy of Omar company and immediately imprisoned.
2009: Went back to the U.S. permanently and he directed the development of a new energy source. (I don’t think this refers to the E-Cat.)
As for the gold trafficking, all I can find points to an ingandrearossi.com page that is only in Italian. The Google translation is as difficult to read as any, but Rossi says the gold was recovered in the Petroldragon effort and claims “And documents deemed illegal sales of gold? All regular! Documents for import and export of precious? All regular! Cash payments? The money laundering? No trace of irregularity, because all economic transactions were made with credit and non-transferable checks, never cash!
The prosecution of Ariano Irpino, even myself, and acquitted all defendants in the investigation, not even get to trial on the grounds that: ‘… lack the evidence necessary to sustain the allegations in a process …’.”
So, was Rossi imprisoned? Yes. Did he break the law? Yes, but mainly because the law changed out from under him. Was he convicted? Yes, on less than 10% of the charges, and they were tax law violations, not a confidence scheme. Is he an evil person out to pull off the scam of the century? Probably not, as he seems to have not run afoul of the law before 1987. Does all this mean we should throw up our hands and write off Rossi’s LENR invention. I don’t think so, though it certainly adds a red flag. How about all the other evidence supporting LENR? I don’t think so. Does Lubos Motl know more about LENR than any of us? Probably, but I’m not convinced he’s right. Is Rossi or LENR too controversial for WUWT? Possibly, but I think it should remain because there are too many experiments with interesting results to be able to dismiss it.
-Ric
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I’m pretty skeptical about this too. That seems to be the general consensus around here. Perhaps a post should have waited a day or two until AFTER confirmation? It all seems a bit odd.
Also.. Poking around a bit, its not too hard to find out the customer appears to be one Manutencoop Facility Management. Here is info on them:
Manutencoop Facility Management S.p.A. provides management services for real estate, building, and equipment. Its services include management and maintenance of heat conditioning, air conditioning and refrigerating systems, antifire systems, electric and lighting systems, buildings, real estate, and technological equipments. The company also provides cleaning and pest control, hospital laundry and sterilization, office support, accessorial, catering and canteen, security, and night watch services; and real estate property services.
It was in properties of the Test_28_10_11.xls spreadsheet. Meh.
Care to place a wager, say, at 1000:1 odds (I say that Rossi is on to something)? I mean, if it’s such a “sure thing” (that’s it’s nothing but the usual perpetual motion scam) in your estimation, what could you lose?
Or, are we (you, actually) simply ‘all talk’?
(Funny thing, I couldn’t get any ‘betting action’ (that things would be okay) back prior to Y2K either …)
.
p.g. sharrow: As a person trained in the “arts” I feel that I can duplicate a working device if nesessary from that information.
Can you get more than 2 watts output without knowing his still secret “catalyst”?
rocky road: Did you know Pons and Fleischmann were never refuted with science–they were the object of political refutation.
You’re kidding, right? No one was ever able to make one of those devices put out either heat or gamma rays reliably.
Cold fusion is a reality.
True, but it consumes more power than it generates, and other people who have devices like those Rossi is claiming to have (he claims extra output because of his secret catalyst) only get about 2 watts of output.
rpercefield: Every time there is an opportunity for Rossi to clearly show the effectiveness of his device, it become an event of obfuscation and secrecy.
That’s my take on his behavior so far.
Mark says:
October 28, 2011 at 8:19 pm
That’s a good brief summary of the last half year or so.
Rocky Road: It is comments like this that stack unwarranted derision on Rossi and others working on LENR.
Some LENR researchers are legitimate, and lab bench scale fusion has been demonstrated in numerous devices. What’s derided is the claim that any of them generate vast amounts of energy.
ROM: Nor were those demands to see the inner workings of an experimental concept at all visible when the very large financial scamming outfit, Enron was spraying press releases around in bulk on how all it’s new financial instruments that nobody had ever used before were going to change the world.
One scam does not justify another. The examples do show that, cunning devious people can outsmart honest, educated, smart people. Pons and Fleischman made substantial money off the State of Utah. Enough to retire to the Riviera. And still people believe that their device worked. Caveat emptor.
u.k.(us)
October 28, 2011 at 7:19 pm
DesertYote says:
October 28, 2011 at 5:47 pm
==========
Rein that horse in, it’s a bit rank.
(Some horses pull hard and are head strong. They are difficult to gallop and to relax in a race. These horses are said to be rank. It is quite an art to try to settle a horse when galloping and breezing, but if they are truly rank its next to impossible).
###
Neigh …
If there was anything to this, Leonardo da Vinci would have drawn up instructions and we’d be using it today.
Looking for resulting copper isotopes, I came upon:
http://www.fysik.org/WebSite/fragelada/resurser/cold_fusion.pdf
which has some written in English:
“The detection of 10% of copper isotopes2 in the residue from the E-Cat is difficult
to understand, especially since only stable copper isotopes (63Cu and 65Cu) are
detected. The isotope ratios of the stable copper isotopes in the residue are the
same as that of natural copper. This is highly unlikely if the copper is produced by
fusion reactions as Rossi claims.”
AND
“Considering that the natural abundance of 58Ni (68%), 62Ni (3.6%) and 64Ni
(0.9%), it is strange that no 59Cu is produced from the abundant 58Ni and that
only the two stable copper isotopes are produced. It seems that nature by magic
has given 62Ni and 64Ni special properties so that stable copper isotopes can be
produced!”
Doesn’t look good for a nuclear reaction.
Report of test:
http://pesn.com/2011/10/28/9501940_1_MW_E-Cat_Test_Successful/
Has pics.
I find this part interesting:
It’s a nuclear device. By the reasoning shown, if I was testing a small nuclear reactor, I could “get around” safety requirements by showing off the reactor to only a few people at a time. Does that make sense to you? How many safety regulations for nuclear devices are one allowed to “duck” by only having a small reactor with limited visitor access?
See the pics. How many people are wearing dosimeter badges?
The device is supposed to generate gamma rays, aka x-rays (the distinction is origin in the nucleus or by an electron outside of a nucleus). Radiation was not detected. Does it look like there was enough shielding?
The identity of the customer is still not known. One of the oldest pitches of hucksters is “I do have other customers,” add in the “I’m not allowed to reveal their names” qualifier to prevent checking of references.
I’m staying extra skeptical of this “discovery.”
Nonsense.
If the thing were real, the scientists involved would do everything in their power to publicly prove that it works, knowing that they would be awarded the Nobel prize and/or silly amounts of seed money.
That would easily raise more money for development than going through these secretive pains to sell one unit.
Hard for me to understand why a skeptical site has so many people, including Anthony(?) reacting strongly to people expressing skepticism about the E-CAT. Seems like the only reasonable reaction given the lack of actual data and the extravagance of the claim. Even the headline seems inappropriate. “Allegedly” would be a better word than “apparently” as the claim really is anything but apparent at this point.
Is that offer open to anyone?
I’d take that bet as long as “something” is defined as a nuclear reaction capable of producing more power than is put into it over the long term including the energy required to produce the catalyst, hydrogen, nickel, and start-up/maintenance fuel.
I’m pretty sure he is on to something alright, a good scam. So, I’d wager $1,000 at 1000 to 1; can you cover that action? Or should we just make it a friendly $0.01 wager @ur momisugly 1000 to 1? I’ll go anywhere in between. I’d make a bet for 12/21/12 too. I wouldn’t bet on “nothing” happening; but I’d bet on nothing globally cataclysmic happening.
But is someone going to spend a million dollars on something that creates only a thousand dollars worth of energy? I mean, technically you are correct in the energy equation but there is also an economic equation that must be satisfied. We have already been stepping over dollars to pick up dimes with the whole “green” energy fiasco.
Look, conventional modern nuclear has the capability to meet ALL of America’s electrical needs if we want to. Reprocessing of the spent fuel means we have no spent fuel problem, either.
People in the future are going to wonder why we were so stupid.
I’ve been following Rossi for some time now,. In my opinion, as a scientist, it COULD be working. As an engineer and practical man, I think my behavior would be similar to his.
If I understand this technology, any one with access to a Fisher Scientific or even Cole-Parmer catalog could be generating heat in a few days. They would likely end up with a melt-down (no big shake…) or radiation poisoning The resulting bad publicity would impact negatively on Rossi’s attempt to commercialize this technology for the good of mankind.
I think there is a better than average chance that the government will try to corral or even ban the spread of this much-needed technology/process.
What people don’t see is his personal investment i.e he sold his house to finance some of the construction. Would you sell your own house if it was a scam?
Everything about this cries out “scam”. If he’s really on to something, he should INSIST on showing everything, asking everyone to reproduce his results; if confirmed, he would instantly become the most famous scientist in history, receive prizes galore, etc. It’s all laughable.
Drive-by comments:
mpaul says:
October 28, 2011 at 4:54 pm (Edit)
The difference is that Mann is a scientist, and the tenets of scientific method have been developed over the centuries with eye toward sharing the knowledge.
Rossi is pursuing business deals – if he doesn’t sell product he doesn’t recoup his investment. Read the next….
DRE says:
October 28, 2011 at 4:54 pm (Edit)
Your assuming one system is covered by one patent. Often not true – you’d have trouble counting all the patents employed in your car. What Rossi hasn’t patented is the catalyst. Instead, that’s protected as a trade secret.
Had this been a scientific process, Rossi would be interested in seeing people reproduce his work. However, his is a profit making business, and hence has no interest in helping someone else, competition or not, in reproducing his system.
Kozlowski says:
October 28, 2011 at 8:44 pm (Edit)
The main reason for posting when I did was to have a single arena for discussion about this. I held out long enough to have something to say. Not odd at all, at least to my thinking.
How is this a supposed test that verifies the claims of Rossi et al?
The vague reports talks about hydrogen and nickel as being the basis.
The proton + proton fusion reaction has a very large Coulomb barrier to overcome:
http://goo.gl/Gvlrf
Two back to back 1.02MeV would be evidence of a fusion reaction.
Without such evidence talk of the power generated by a fusion reaction is meaningless.
Scam.
I’ve read most of the LENR papers and I’d make the following observations.
1. LENR is definitely a real energy producing phenomena, although its not clear its fusion.
2. Without a theoretical basis, researchers are to a large extent stabbing in the dark in attempts to refine it and make it more reliable and produce more energy.
3. The composition of the catalyst seems to be the key to getting LENR working.
4. If this is a scam, its in the sense that they have don’t have a commercially viable energy source (yet?). Not that LENR setups can’t produce excess energy, that has been independently demonstrated dozens of times.
IMHO one important reason Pons and Fleischman were ridiculed and frankly persecuted was that LENR as a viable energy source would have derailed the trillion dollar CAGW gravy train early on.
How can this supposed test be considered evidence of the claims of Rossi et al?
The vague report mentions hydrogen and nickel.
The proton + proton fusion [hydrogen + hydrogen] fusion reaction has a very large Coloumb barrier to overcome.
Wikipedia: http://goo.gl/Gvlrf
Evidence for such a reaction would the back to back production of two back to back photons with the characteristic energy, 511 keV, of electron + positron annihilation:
Wikipedia: http://goo.gl/SQ09v
Without such evidence, talking about the amount of power produced by hydrogen fusion is meaningless.
Pure scam.
PT Barnum would be proud that someone is following in his footsteps…
Ric,
You are going to feel really stupid, when this fraud is exposed.
People think its a scam because they dont understand the science behind it… Cold fusion is not really “cold”. It is hot fusion on a small scale. Some how the the Columb barrier is overcome either on a local scale by acceleration of the ion(electron) in nanometers to thousands of eV or the barrier is dropped by some sort of resonance between the atoms.. The events take place one at a time in the lattice unlike a H bomb or a Tokamak which is what everyone thinks of when they think of fusion…. Palladium and Deuterium at a 1:1 ratio works but its hard to make this happen consistently(Check out SPAWAR Labs). Nickle catalysts have been known for awhile. It was just a matter of time before some figured out how to make it work… Now here is the only thing, you might have to account for the energy by adding a parameter called “aether”, which by the way has not been disproved. You almost have to..
At Lenr you can check out some of the papers that people have published… These are not stupid people, they are actually some of the smartest….
Lenr-canr Library.
http://www.lenr-canr.org/LibFrame1.html
Very typical fraud.
“5 hours of heat production”.
Laugh.
It’s purely chemical.
Which woodenhead pays for this scam?
This must (still) be a scam. There must be dozens of Hot Water -> Electricity , off-the-shelf solutions where Rossi could have generated the required electricity to keep using the so called “Powered Mode” and still keep it stable off the harvested energy its supposedly producing. That way he could have run it for days and then there would have been no doubt about the result.
He didn’t. Its nonsense.
“While Rossi initially expected to provide streaming video of the test…”
“Rossi also promised hourly updates during the test, but that didn’t happen…”
Don’t these give you even the slightest pause?
I remain sceptical until the process is independently reproduced.
I view the comments of those who vehemently dismiss it as a scam the same way as I view those who propound anthropogenic CO2-induced global warming.
Genuine scams are designed to bring some benefit to the perpetrator. Rossi seems to be investing a lot of cash and energy into this for what? Any fame or reward will quickly evaporate if the scam cannot be sustained, or are the detractors suggesting that he is at the start of some Ponzi scheme that will suck in more and more investors’ money as he builds bigger and bigger reactors ad infinitum?
At worst, I suspect the man is deluding himself, at best he will satisfy the AGW fanatics’ search for a CO2 free energy source that will allow politicians off the hook over the ludicrous windmill/photovoltaic/big stick/industrial decline (sorry, I should say green) solutions that they now favour.