The thought occurred - wouldn't it be a hoot if the hydrogen, in one version of Ni-H, was not really a reactant!
It is possible that nano-nickel when it is engineered to be present in both
ferromagnetic and antiferromagnetic form within the reactor, and triggered
thermally to oscillate between the two, can be thermally gainful alone
(without hydrogen contribution).
In that eventuality, the main purpose of hydrogen is to remove heat from a
nanopowder - which would normally have very poor heat transfer properties
via conduction.
Hydrogen, despite its flammability - is used in industry as a
high-performance coolant when nothing else will suffice. According to
Wiki-the-wise, hydrogen-cooled generators are the most common electrical
generators in large power plants.
Hydrogen's thermal conductivity is higher than any other gas. When thermal
control is critical, there is no substitute. No other gas can penetrate and
remove nearly as much heat from nanopowder, even if that is not its only
function.
Plus, H2 has high mobility, high specific heat capacity, low density, low
viscosity and hydrogen is one of two gases whose Joule-Thomson inversion
temperatures is low. Thus, hydrogen warms up when expanded at constant
enthalpy which might also be a factor in thermal gain, if there is a
densification function going on at the same time (i.e. pycno-hydrogen).
Also, it should realized that SPPs do not require hydrogen. SPPs are waves
which travel along a metal-dielectric interface and NiO would be the
dielectric. Everything about LENR is pointing to one or more non-nuclear
pathways which may work along with a nuclear pathway or not, within a
complex system which is much more difficult to grasp in its entirety than
anyone realizes.
Ockham's razor is a lazy man's crutch. It has no useful place in this field.
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If we overlook the issue of naming the ultimate source of
thermal gain in LENR, then the simple process of building a system which
oscillates from order-to-disorder and back again, sequentially and rapidly
without corresponding input and at rates of change which are high
(terahertz), then we are poised to find anti-entropy and a significant
anomaly. Order <-> disorder <-> order is adequate for gain, with or without
a nuclear pathway.
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