In a mail sent out, apparently, to NET subscribers, Steve Krivit
continues his campaign about heat and helium. I did make an
additional reply on his blog that he did not publish; it was
published here when it did not show up there after a day. I don't
know if it got lost somehow or he elected not to publish it, but
other criticism contained in the other response that he *did*
publish, besides the obvious error of imagining that 10 x 10^15 and 1
x 10^16 were different by an "order of magnitude," was edited out by him.
So, instead of submitting this response to NET, I'm putting it here,
and I'm granting Krivit permission to publish this or non-misleading
excerpts from this, according to his editorial judgment, provided
that he provides a link to the original on the Vortex list.
"Cold Fusion" (but not LENR) Claims Questioned
Follow-up to New Energy Times Issue 34
Feb. 9, 2010
Dear Readers,
We published Issue 34 of New Energy Times on Jan. 31. In it,
we reveal how scientists at SRI International and MIT, claiming
evidence for the theory of "cold fusion," have misled the public,
their peers, the Department of Energy and the reviewers of the
2004 DoE LENR review.
That's a big claim. Was there any evidence provided that they
actually "misled" anyone? What I've seen is that Krivit misinterprets
what they've written, and then argues strongly against his own
misinterpretation. The error he made where he imagined that a change
between 10 x 10^15 and 1 X 10^15 represented a "change" in Violante's
data (see below) revealed how much he was searching for
inconsistencies and how little he was paying attention to what
Violante was actually telling him.
Since NET34 published, we have received no response, let alone
corrections, from any of the principal subjects of the story,
Michael McKubre (SRI International), Peter Hagelstein (MIT
and Naval Postgraduate School) and Vittorio Violante (ENEA
Frascati). The three are members of an informal consortium that
has collaborated on research, publications, intellectual property
claims and shared in federally funded LENR research.
It is obvious from a careful review of the Violante report in NET
that there was no reason for Violante to respond. He was improperly
accused of stonewalling when, in fact, he'd answered Krivit's
questions, as shown by Krivit's report and the original slide show
and later-published conference paper, and then of making a huge error
and of not retracting it. He'd already responded several times to
what amounted to badgering, patiently explaining. The "no response"
is, certainly for Violante, a non-story.
As to McKubre and Hagelstein, I've examined those reports in much
less detail, but where I have, so far, I've found that Krivit
misinterprets and misrepresents what they actually wrote, and, I
assume, by now, they are *so over* responding to Krivit. And that's a
shame. It would be better if Krivit gets himself a real editorial
board and listens to it. Otherwise he's likely to continue shooting
himself in the foot, to imagine that a few people praising his
boldness means that he's on the right track, and, in the end, see the
collapse of NET.
1. "24 MeV/4He" Does Not Exist
Contrary to what the public has heard and believed, the
purported best evidence for the theory of low-energy nuclear
reactions as a "cold fusion" reaction, specifically
the highly promoted
<http://click.icptrack.com/icp/relay.php?r=12443158&msgid=222567&act=3CD9&c=229442&destination=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.iccf-14.org%2Fterminology.html>claim
of ~24 MeV/4He, does not exist.
With this, Krivit does effectively dismiss the strongest evidence for
LENR (not for "cold fusion," a much more complex subject that I will
address as well). The evidence is not a claim of 24 MeV. It is
correlation between excess heat as measured and excess helium as
measured, at a Q value that is "consistent with" D-D fusion (which
would ostensibly produce, if gamma emission is absent or other
radiation where significant energy would escape measurement, 23.8
MeV/He-4, if helium is formed. Which Krivit correctly points out is
"not expected." However, helium *is* formed, it is correlated with
excess energy, and the ratio of energy to helium is such that the
conversion of deuterium to helium, by whatever process, would predict
energy that is roughly the same as found. And this is multiply
confirmed, many research groups, and not just Hagelstein and McKubre
and Violante.
That the ratio is in the right range for D-D fusion does not at all
prove that the reaction is D-D fusion, what Krivit below calls
"thermonuclear fusion," nor have I seen claims that it does from any
responsible researcher, including McKubre, Hagelstein, and Violante.
2. Helium-4 is Not Expected*
Helium-4 is a rare product of D-D thermonuclear fusion. Its
finding in LENR in significant quantities is inconsistent with
thermonuclear fusion. Its promotion by the subgroup as
evidence of D-D "cold fusion" is misleading.
It certainly is a rare product of thermonuclear fusion. Obvious
conclusion: "Cold fusion," whatever it is, is not "D-D thermonuclear
fusion." And I've seen no recent claims that it is. Could it be some
form of D-D fusion? Perhaps. But 24 MeV (or Storms' 25 +/- 5 MeV/He4,
more to the point) doesn't prove that, and it would be an error to
assert that it does. If the researchers were making that error,
Krivit's objection would be cogent. They aren't, so it's not.
However, that helium is being produced, and that it is correlated
with heat, is the strongest evidence for LENR to day. There is no way
to produce helium without nuclear reactions. The energy released will
depend on the fuel. From many evidences the most likely fuel in a
Fleischmann-type cell, in an Arata cell, etc., is deuterium. Even if
the reaction is some kind of neutron catalysis, for example, the
energy produced would be expected to be in the range found. Or if it
is formation of Be-8 from four deuterons, per Takahashi. Or if,
indeed, there is some kind of Mossbauer-like effect in the lattice,
and it actually is D-D fusion and the normal branching ratio is
somehow suppressed and the energy is communicated to the whole
lattice (sounds very unlikely to me....), that would be the energy found.
The point is not the actual energy or the actual reaction, at this
point. The point is that we are finding helium, in roughly the right
amounts to correspond to a deuterium fuel and helium ash, given the
measured excess energy. If the energy measurements are artifact, or
the helium measurements are artifact, or both, we would not find a
correlation that was so consistently in the right region. It would be
way off. Indeed, in the 2004 DoE report, the summary mangled the
helium data, and what they reported would actually have been an
anti-correlation, if true. Here is what they said:
The hypothesis that excess energy production in electrolytic cells
is due to low energy nuclear reactions
was tested in some experiments by looking for D + D fusion reaction
products, in particular 4He,
normally produced in about 1 in 10^7 in hot D + D fusion reactions.
Results reported in the review
document purported to show that 4He was detected in five out of
sixteen cases where electrolytic cells
were reported to be producing excess heat. The detected 4He was
typically very close to, but reportedly
above background levels. This evidence was taken as convincing or
somewhat convincing by some
reviewers; for others the lack of consistency was an indication that
the overall hypothesis was not
justified. Contamination of apparatus or samples by air containing
4He was cited as one possible cause
for false positive results in some measurements.
If it were true that 4He was only "detected in five out of sixteen
cases where electrolytic cells were reported to be producing excess
heat," this would have been a poor correlation indeed. However, given
the far stronger correlation known, (well covered by Storms based on
results from Miles et al, published long ago), the explanations of
contamination from air would be a serious stretch. Why only
experiments with excess heat? Why the correlation at roughly the same
Q factor? When sources of error are considered, the correlation is,
just as has been said, "consistent with the value expected from D-D
fusion " but it's a serious mistake to assume that this proves D-D
fusion. It doesn't, and the reports show that understanding. That's
why they say "consistent with."
I won't repeat the details of the correlation, how in all cells where
there was no excess heat, there was no helium, and how in almost all
cells with excess heat, helium was found, but this covers, in Miles'
work along, much more than sixteen cells.
The DoE reviewer, it turns out, was following an error made by one of
the negative reviewers, and compounded the error. There is no result
"reported in the review document" that reads like what the reviewer
stated. I did find the source of the error; the appendix was a bit
difficult to read and rather easily misinterpreted if someone was not
reading carefully.
3. Only a Subgroup Is Responsible
A subgroup of the LENR field comprising some of the most
prominent leaders of the field (mostly Americans) is
primarily
responsible for causing this misperception.
What misperception? I wasn't fooled. Who was? I'm suspecting that
Steve was, that he didn't read the statements and claims carefully
enough, jumped to his own conclusion, and now blames the researchers,
who wrote with care and accuracy -- at least generally -- for his own error.
What's the cause of the misperception? Well, most notably, that
researchers are reporting a Q factor in a range that could be
consistent with D-D fusion, though certainly with not enough
precision yet, or with not enough independent replication, to nail
down the number.
Complicating this is the very real possibility that there is more
than one reaction taking place, and that some variation in results
may be due to variations in the reactions themselves. Suppose, for
example, that what is happening is Be-8 formation in a Bose-Einstein
condensate. This can produce secondary reactions which might absorb
some of the energy or generate additional energy. We know that other
reactions are occurring (because, for example, we know now that there
are low levels of neutrons generated), but the question is *how
much*? From the Q factors found, it appears reasonable to hypothesize
that the *primary fuel* is deuterium and that the *primary ash* is
helim. But by no means is this the whole story. And it's still just a
theory. But, not, this is not a "thermonuclear fusion" theory.
It isn't "thermonuclear fusion," and I know of nobody who thinks it
is. Not for CF, anyway. Bubble fusion would be that, it's not "cold"
fusion, it is very, very hot. Don't confuse the average temperature
of a cell with the temperature in a bubble that is collapsing! (I
don't know of bubble fusion is really happening and I have no opinion
on it, but cold fusion, it isn't; the whole issue is just how hot
those bubbles get!)
4. Other Potential Energetic Processes Discarded
The subgroup misled the public into believing that excess
heat and non-energetic helium-4 were the only confirmed
evidence for LENR. This distracted the public from more
closely analyzing why the D-D "cold fusion" hypothesis fell
so short in explaining the many other observed phenomena
in LENR.
It's certainly not the only confirmed evidence for LENR, though it is
probably the most prominent among those who understand the field. Who
has claimed this? Where is this "misled" "public"?
By the way, Krivit is generally confused on many aspects of the
helium issue. He refers to "non-energetic helium-4." Some theories
would predict non-energetic helium, such as a theory that proposes
that energy is somehow transferred to the lattice instead of a gamma
ray being emitted. However, other theories predict energetic helium,
at various energies. Takahashi's theory predicts helium with energy
ranging from about 90 keV on up to the maximum of 23.8 MeV, but very
little would be that energetic, it depends on how long the Be-8
sticks around before decaying into two alpha particles. If it decays
immediately, the He-4 will have maximum energy, but what will happen
with it will depend on the generation site. That helium will rapidly
lose its energy to the solid or liquid environment. If there is much
very high-energy helium, we'd expect to see Bremmstrahlung radiation
in amounts that are apparently not reported. But most of the energy
would, in fact, be emitted by the excited Be-8 nucleus as photons (in
the EUV range?) and would, again, end up as "non-energetic helium"
and heat when absorbed, as it would be.
The "observed phenomena" in LENR are extremely complex, but fusion,
if it takes place, is likely to be pretty messy. The only theory that
would predict non-messy reactions would be one where fusion takes
place in some kind of "locked" relationship with the lattice or with
the deuterium held by the lattice (or both), so that the energy is
mostly or entirely transferred to the bulk, leaving too little to
trigger secondary reactions. Since we do see, apparently, secondary
reactions, I tentatively assume that energetic products are produced,
or, as well, there are additional possible reactions. For example,
the Tetrahedral Symmetric Condensate predicted by Takahashi would be
neutral and could itself fuse with either deuterium or palladium,
copiously present, or maybe with other minor nuclear species present.
But, mostly, it would not have time to hit anything and would
spontaneously decay into helium. Hot helium nuclei can also cause
secondary reactions.
There is no established D-D "cold fusion" hypothesis, explaining the
variety of phenomena that have been seen, sufficiently well to
produce experimental predictions that can then be tested, or, if one
does, the predictions are quite difficult to test. Or if easy, for
some reason, the tests have not been performed and published -- or
they have, but the publications are obscure. There is a *ton* of
stuff out there.
Behind Krivit's "story" is a semantic issue. Krivit seems to favor
Widom-Larsen theory, involving ultra low-momentum neutrons. Setting
aside many well-known objections to this theory, how does W-L theory
explain the generation of helium? You can't just take neutrons and
mash them together to make helium, not without Other Stuff Happening.
But suppose, by a series of reactions (and what I've seen of W-L
theory requires a series of reactions, leading to a question of how a
long series of reactions could take place with little detection, if
any, of the intermediate products, and I don't see how one could get
from a neutron and a deuteron to a helium nucleus without some
intermediate product! However, perhaps the neutrons wander into some
heavier nucleus and cause it to fission, generating an alpha
particle. But why just this one reaction, and not many other known
neutron activation reactions?)
In my book, however, adding neutrons to nuclei is a form of fusion.
It's building up heavier elements from lighter ones, the essence of
fusion, releasing the heat from mass loss. It's just a name that
implies one of two major nuclear reactions: fission or fusion.
The Q factor found from experiment implies, but does not prove, that
the primary fuel is deuterium and the primary ash is helium, but more
than that it cannot yet do. Nor does this rule out LENR reactions
that don't involve deuterium. We could expect from them, though,
different Q factors.
To reiterate, the measurement of Q factor, thus far, is not accurate
enough to prove D-D fusion or equivalent (Be-8 fusion is equivalent
in result, but would completely resolve the branching ratio issue, it
would be 4D -> Be-8 -> 2 He-4 + 47.6 MeV, and the 47.6 would end up
almost entirely as heat. 4D fusion seems really unlikely to people,
when this is first brought up, because if 2D fusion is difficult, 3D
fusion would be ridiculous, and 4D fusion beyond impossible. However,
4D is just two deuterium molecules, and Takahashi proposes, as I read
it, that they form a Bose-Einstein condensate in lattice confinement,
which would put them in a symmetrical, tetrahedral arrangement. And
then he calculates that if the TSC forms, it will collapse and fuse
with 100% frequency within a femtosecond. I imagine it has something
to do with the deuterons, so to speak, backing up to each other,
neutron ends facing the center of the tetrahedron, and getting close
enough for the nuclear force to take over; the Coulomb forces act on
the "proton end" of these nuclei, and would be reduced, additionally,
by the presence of the molecular electrons. This, then, would explain
why CF is a surface effect, because deuterium gas is not present in
the bulk; whereas at the actual surface, there would be inadequate
confinement. It would have to happen just below the surface and,
fortunately, it happens -- if this theory is correct -- at a very low
rate. Very rare to get two deuterium molecules in a single lattice
position, even one is necessarily transient, but I have no idea if
such phenomena have been investigated adequately.
Just a theory. What impresses me is the results of the experiments
finding helium and heat, well-correlated. When I realize the
significance of that, I became, relatively speaking, a "believer."
But I'll still listen to anyone who can explain to me how heat and
helium could be so well correlated without fusion (or some other
nuclear reaction that produces helium and heat).
5. Experimental Evidence of LENR Is Strong
The consequences of attempting to sell people and the U.S.
government on the speculative, unsupported theory of
"cold fusion" caused them to have less confidence in the
very real and strong experimental evidence of LENR.
I saw the 2004 DoE report as an attempt to "sell" LENR. Not their
particular theory. They did propose a theory, but LENR does not
depend on that theory. I assume I'll look at this in more detail later.
(A common claim of the skeptics is that there are no theories that
could explain CF. There are; as Storms points out, there really are
too many! Storms does not consider any of them adequate, so far, to
explain all the known observations. I don't necessarily agree, but
his position is certainly reasonable, and my understanding of TSC
theory is primitive enough that my opinion is proof of about nothing.
I do wish someone would criticize Takahashi's work in a peer-reviewed
publication. It has been mentioned by Mosier-Boss, simply as a
possibility, in the triple-track paper. But has anyone actually
confirmed his math? Is there other work looking at estimating the
frequency of TSC formation?
The helium correlation with excess heat is, in fact, the strongest
evidence for LENR that I've seen, at least that has been widely
confirmed. There is other strong evidence that doesn't enjoy such
broad confirmation or acceptance; for example, the Mossbauer
spectroscopy results from Vyosotskii, in an experiment that should,
quite possibly, be easy to replicate. If his report is accurate, it's
actually conclusive that LENR is taking place, managed by bacteria,
biological transmutation. But confirmed, not. Why not, I don't know.
Too far out? I have seen no reports of attempts at replication that
failed. Somebody, at least, is taking the Vyosotskii reports
seriously, such as Krivit and Marwan in the ACS Sourcebook (2008).
What Vyosotskii shows is nucleosynthesis of Fe-57, confirmed with the
very specific Mossbauer spectroscopy, unique to that isotope, in the
presence of deuterium and manganese and a bacterium like deinococcus
radiodurans.
6. LENR Progress Delayed
The subgroup's efforts to promote its "cold fusion" theory
have come at the expense of the acceptance and recognition
of the entire LENR field.
Hogwash.
I have elsewhere criticized the Hagelstein report to the DoE, but
they were faced with a difficult task. Given the magnitude of the
task, they did reasonably well. Being competent researchers does not
necessarily equate to being skilled politicians, and the issue has
long been, really, political in nature. Could they have done better?
Probably. But the 2004 DoE review was a stunning turnabout, compared to 1989.
Krivit is attacking some of the best work that we have, and without
showing a clear understanding of it. His report on Violante was
outrageous, and, while he's corrected a detail, the very substantial
errors in his analysis have yet to be confronted. He expects
researchers to retract errors that they didn't even make, but he
makes huge mistakes, and lets them sit. Because?
What I suggest is that the community start preparing another report,
this time a consensus report that is widely agreed as containing the
clearest and best evidence. It can contain minority reports, don't
worry, it does not require that everyone agree! But the best evidence
would, indeed, be in there, and clearly explained. Even skeptics
could help prepare this report, the genuine ones, who would point out
where evidence is weak, who would point out what research remains to
be done to more solidly establish the field (or, from another
perspective, to point out how the whole thing might be a Big Mistake
-- but that's getting to be a more and more untenable position).
