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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Lucy Skywalker: You cannot just handwave a team like this away.
If it is a hoax, it is the most elaborate hoax I have ever read of.
On the other hand, those team members are none of them close to the hardware when it is running.
A few of the posters do not seem to grasp or admit that what has been replicated that is “like” Rossi’s device (or devices when many are connected) is a device that produces very low power output. Low energy, cold, benchtop (etc.) fusion has been demonstrated. Not Pons and Fleischman (who did perpetrate a profitable hoax) but some others. Reliable stories appear from time to time (I read one in American Scientist about 15 years ago), and reliable devices are used to produce isotopes for medical purposes. They are consumers of power, not producers.
Now, back to the team. No one other than Rossi knows what is in his “catalyst”, so speculation about how the device manages to produce so much power, if it does, are pure speculation. Has anyone other than Rossi himself said what all those team members have contributed? Has anyone publicly claimed to know what is in Rossi’s catalyst?
I’m quite skeptical. Rossi continues to be weirder than weird, and I don’t see any long term performance ruling out an exothermic chemical reaction, If I had to bet, it would be that Rossi is sincere, but wrong.
I am quite happy to see it in discussed in this blog. There are not many places where curious folks from such diverse backgrounds converse. There is a difference in discussing nuclear and chemical reactions, and arguing about intelligent design. One can, and ultimately will, be tested and proven. What I am looking for in the discussion is:
–What evidence and measurements will give us definitive answers
–What news is out there that the evidence and measurements are coming available.
Seems WUWT is providing both.
Anthony, re Rossi’s earlier troubles — I don’t see anything there that suggests the technology was fraudulent, it seems to just say that they didn’t follow environmental regulations and the tax code. It certainly doesn’t help his cause here, but I don’t think it should be viewed as disqualifying — I live a few miles from the mansion built by Insull before he was charged with fraud when the electricity bubble burst in the first half of the 20th.
bologna
Rod Everson: If it’s a scam it’s both elaborate and foolish, for it’s hard to see how Rossi cashes out, especially if he’s in hock up to his ears already.
We only have Rossi’s say-so on that one, don’t we? He only has to have one “investor” of some kind give him cash up front, not likely the State Gov’t of Utah, but perhaps a rich idiosyncratic technology junky like Howard Hughes, or a consortium of movie stars, or a credulous fund manager like the guys who cost Sumitomo, Orange County California, and Barings so much money. The list of “marks” goes on and on. Really, have not we all read of scams and thought: How could smart, well-informed people have fallen for such a scam?
Rossi only has to find one rich contrarian willing to lend him $2million up front. After all, if this thing works it’s worth lots more than $2million to start production under patent protection.
Paraphrasing Lincoln, you only have to fool one rich person one time.
If it works I’ll have to eat crow, but again remember the main issue at stake: low energy fusion has been reliably demonstrated; the incredible part of Rossi’s claim is a sustained high power output.
RockyRoad: “The pressure I bring to bear is for everybody to get up-to-speed on LENR before shooting their mouths off.”
Thanks for your advice. I assure you that I know about this business more than all the world’s champions of LENR combined.
As I’ve said in comments, we try out ideas here.
No quarrel from me. This has been a fun read. Statisticians tolerate a 5% false positive rate on new ideas, higher if there is a possible high payoff.
This is another pipe dream. The customer is either not a real customer but a plant, or they’re very stupid for offering any money.
I have friends with inventions that actually work, but they can’t get funding because when they talk to their funding sources they speak in caveats and realities. People like this promise those with money that they’ll be richer beyond imagination and they secure decades of income from what is ultimately a lie.
RockyRoad says:
October 29, 2011 at 10:39 am
John B says:
October 29, 2011 at 10:23 am
…
How can a group of self-professed “skeptics” be so gullible?
They can be up-to-speed on LENR. That’s what informed skeptics do. And you? Can I call you “gullible” for not being up to speed on LENR? No, there is a better term–(I’ll let you fill in the blank).
—————–
Up to speed on LENR? OK, did that. If LENR is verified it would be the biggest thing since… Well, the biggest thing ever. We could stop burning coal for one thing, and start using virtually limitless, virtually free energy. It would be unbelievably huge!!! But, it goes against everything known to mainstream physics. That does not, in itself, mean it is wrong. After all, fission and (hot) fusion went against everything that was known at the time they were discovered. So Pons, Fleischman, Focardi, Rossi, just show the world a working, verifiable, replicable experiment. It doesn’t need to generate a Megawatt. A single Watt would do nicely, as long as it comes from a mechanism that can be exploited. Just like the Wright brothers’ flight only needed to last 30 seconds to be momentous.
Septic Matthew says:
October 29, 2011 at 10:57 am
…
low energy fusion has been reliably demonstrated
…
—————-
Where? When? By whom?
I’m sorry, I just can’t see how Andrea Rossi can benefit from this, if it is in fact a scam. He would have to flee somewhere, with the money, to benefit. What country would shield him from such fraud recovery and/or prosecution (and who would want to live there, for the rest of his life).
That only leaves, self delusion, as a possible explanation for the scheme (other than it works). This would apply to Rossi, but certainly not the customer. The customer specifies what proof of utility, is required to satisfy his commercial viability. This is a financial requirement NOT a scientific requirement. Scientific principles are important, but function and results trump scientific principles – every time. Not understanding how color was encoded into color television broadcast signals, hardly made a difference, to widespread usage. Our visual cortex, just didn’t care. Until recent, new analysis data, bumble bees could not fly.
Does this mean that we should all start celebrating and jump on the bandwagon?
Of course not!
We should remain skeptical, until such time, utility has been demonstrated to US. At that time, many people will be scrambling to provide scientific explanations and we can then argue them to our heart’s content. We can not expect more from Rossi, unless we are willing to become customers.
This invention, IF as stated will upset many apple carts and will directly affect the livelihood, of many who blog here. Nervous… You betcha.
Btw, I would gladly bet $1000 at 1000:1 odds, that there is something here, just as soon as someone, provides proof that they are capable of paying the $1,000,000, in the unlikely event that the demonstration proves legit. Any wealthy fools out there? John West…? anybody?
In the meantime, I will continue to follow this project with proper skepticism and an open mind, until resolution. If that is being reckless… then color me reckless. GK
davidmhoffer: …that being until he has sufficient financial backing to defend the patent.
Precisely.
David Wood: I’m amazed at the mindless, hostile skepticism expressed by so many here.
By my tally, the skeptics are more mindful than the non-skeptics.
There has been enough verification and replication of positive LENR results that for anyone to call this “perpetual motion” as one on this thread, is just willful ignorance.
In that sentence you omit the necessity to document that the output energy has to exceed the input energy (the difference supplied by the masses of the fused nuclei.)
I find it quite odd that Anthony is being pilloried by some for allowing this article to be posted.
The purpose, as stated by Anthony, of the posting is to allow resident skeptics an opportunity to deconstruct the premise that this Rossi LENR device works. That is pretty much what is occurring here.
The bulk of comments do not support the premise for the same or similar reasons most here reject the CAGW thesis. Too much reliance on “magic” processes that are either hidden by the proponent or are contrary to a basic understanding of physical processes.
While I admit that I harbor some hope that Rossi’s process might work, I do not find his most recent demonstration convincing – AT ALL. If Rossi wants to convince anyone he needs to be fully transparent from the get go – from set up to final results.
I don’t want to get caught in a passionate argument, but it has to be said: how is Lubos’s blog too “eye-bending”? it’d need a lot more psychedelia before it were enough for my taste. I even turned javascript on to make sure that I wasn’t missing something (besides the formulas).
Maybe I’m wrong about it and about Rossi’s claims’ being wrong and, if so, I’ll eat – not crow – but humble pie, by my surefire recipe: Toasted poppy or sesame bagel sliced into sandwiching halves, between which, place melted cheese, scrambled egg, and grilled bacon, ham, and sausage. Kim chee optional. No orthodox pie but it makes every prediction win-win.
Peter Brown says:
October 29, 2011 at 10:31 am
No, Solyndra was political payback for a campaign contribution. That’s a huge difference. (Looks like we’ll have a string of these coming up–next will be Sun Solar, followed by a bunch of others, to the tune of about $20 Billion!) So much for Hope and Change! (Now THERE’S a SCAM for ya!)
Doug in Seattle says:
October 29, 2011 at 11:38 am
Interesting, Doug. Rossi’s intent in this demonstration wasn’t to convince you, at all. He only needed to convince his customer, and he doesn’t even need to tell you who his customer is (or even how it works; I’m betting his customer doesn’t even require that). That’s how a lot of “business” as I know it around the world. I’m rather surprised Rossi let anybody from the public in to watch.
Luboš Motl says:
October 29, 2011 at 11:03 am
Thanks, Lubos, for the best laugh I’ve had in quite a while.
Luboš Motl says:
Your lack of aesthetic sense for blog design has absolutely nothing to do with these issues
———————————————————————————————————————-
Lubos, it is not just ugly, it locks up my computer more than any site I visit.
For John B, here is one account: http://www.americanscientist.org/issues/pub/1999/7/fusion-from-television
The device makes a neutron beam for making medical isotopes. It is a net energy consumer, not a net energy generator. I have read of other designs, all small devices, all net energy consumers.
Septic Matthew says:
October 29, 2011 at 11:33 am
Yet you apparently don’t require that of the $billions that have been and will be spent on the Tokamak and other hot fusion approaches. The only reason that approach is pursued is because we can all look at the sun and get the big picture, or the fact that H bombs have been tested and they work. But putting the sun in a bottle, so to speak, is proving to be far more difficult and expensive than ever imagined.
So why apply a more stringent approach to hot fusion than cold? Is it because the PTB are supported by those who receive grants for such work, and both groups work tirelessly to sway public opinion to be supportive of their programs?
Sounds just like CAGW.
“…the human race is home free and the climate doomsters are going to have to find another bogey man to use in their quest for riches and world domination. ”
Funny – but Rossi IS the new bogey man. The climate clan are leading the denial campaign against LENR – cause they cannot administer it through a UN or global guv’mnt. Rocky Road has this right, there are a minimum of 1200 peer reviewed papers documenting the LENR effect, readily available through science libraries e.g. LANL library. The 2009 CBS 60 Minutes Report “Cold Fusion is Hot Again” covers the last 20 years of research into LENR, the ABC-TV report on the Patterson Power Cell (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jze7KtdHfh8) covers tangential inventions (issued a US patent), we have confirmation of DOD R&D via FOI documents from Wright Patterson AFB, Randall Mills’ Blacklight Power has a remarkable record of peer reviewed confirmation of excess heat from Ni+H, and there are a dozen “inventors” of variations on Rossi Focardi, Mills, Patterson, et al LENR generators.
i.e. The EVIDENCE of a real, confirmed LENR effect is indisputable. So, why all the doubt? Getting the LENR process to “loop” or self-sustain, has been the stumbling block. Both Foccardi/Rossi and Randall Mills claim they’ve got a way to control this – which means the process and excess heat can be delivered for commercial use. But should we not have bonafide “scientists” involved? The CBS story addresses that issue and the recent statement by NASA Langley Research Chief Scientist Dennis Bushnell regarding LENR provides further clues:
“So I think were almost over the “We don’t understand it” problem. I think we’re almost over the “This doesn’t produce anything useful” problem. And so I think this [LENR] will go forward fairly rapidly now. And if it does, this is capable of, by itself, completely changing geo-economics, geopolitics of solving quite a bit of [the] energy [problem.]”
Energy Chair of the Swedish Academy of Science Sven Kullander and fellow physicist Hanno Essen have seen Rossi’s process and written a report:
“Any chemical process should be ruled out for producing 25 kWh from whatever is in a 50 cubic centimeter container. The only alternative explanation is that there is some kind of a nuclear process that gives rise to the measured energy production.”
The skepticism we have is that LENR will make it to commercial production without intervention.
“After a few more flashes in the pan, we shall hear very little more of Edison and his electric lamp. Every claim he makes has been tested and proved impracticable.” New York Times, January16th, 1880
Luboš Motl:
RockyRoad says “The pressure I bring to bear is for everybody to get up-to-speed on LENR before shooting their mouths off.”
Thanks for your advice. I assure you that I know about this business more than all the world’s champions of LENR combined.
Please indicate. Enquiring minds like to know. Thanks.
Rocky Road: http://energycatalyzer3.com/news/some-of-rossi%e2%80%99s-cold-fusion-results-reportedly-replicated
If you read the power point presentation, you will note that the inventor calls it a “battery”, and makes no claims that the net energy output exceeds the net energy input.
Good to read an open-minded yet critical/skeptical report.
Rocky Road: Yet you apparently don’t require that of the $billions that have been and will be spent on the Tokamak and other hot fusion approaches.
Really? Have I claimed that those are net energy producers, or has anyone, as Rossi claims for his device?