Who Buried Cold Fusion? An Open Letter to Michael Moore

The following open letter to Michael Moore was submitted by E-Cat World reader Kelley Trezise

To Mr. Michael Moore: Who Buried Cold Fusion?

I am addressing this letter to you as you are known as someone who has no fear of stepping into controversy. With that I still feel compelled to warn you, that if you take on the suggested project you will be kicking over a hornet’s nest of trouble.

The field of Cold Fusion (CF) or Low Energy Nuclear Reactions (LENR) has existed since early 1989 when Drs. Fleischmann and Pons (PF) introduced the world to the possibility of causing fusion of nuclei at relatively low temperatures in a simple apparatus and at low cost. The experiments conducted by those researchers were criticized as poorly done and it was decided by the larger part of the scientific community that they were mistaken and that no such reactions were possible.

There were in the crush of researchers that attempted to replicate the PF experiments, a few who received positive results. Their reports of net heat out, neutrons, and other indications of a nuclear processes taking place within their apparatus were mostly ignored, suppressed, or attacked viciously and those researchers were ordered to stop their experiments, pushed to leave academia, ostracized, pilloried in the press and in a few cases accused (falsely) of fraud. In spite of the abuse and threats, a few brave researchers, mostly tenured professors or those retired, continued their researches, many with their own money.

The data collected over the years accumulated in these labs, but access to the usual peer reviewed journals was cut off as those journals refused to publish any paper associated with CF/LENR. New journals were created and conferences dedicated to the field allowed some amount of communication of results, but despite the accumulating evidence, the field has struggled to be accepted. For years, inventors who applied for patents for devices reliant on CF/LENR have received the same response from the U.S. Patent office: a copy of a New York Times article explaining that cold fusion does not work, and a copy of a statement by MIT professors stating that they could not replicate PF cold fusion claims.

There has been recently a very positive but mysterious development in the field of CF/LENR with the invention of the Energy Catalyzer or E-Cat as the inventor Dr. Andrea Rossi prefers to call it. Whereas earlier devices had relatively low coefficients of performance (COP the ratio of energy output from the device to energy input to the device), this device has a minimum COP of six and ranges up to the hundreds depending upon how it is operated. The inventor claims the device fuses ordinary hydrogen and nickel thereby producing copper and large amounts of energy (tens of kilowatts) from a device of perhaps one liter in volume. It produces no radioactive waste, nor radiation that cannot be blocked easily (neutrons) and is very cheap to build and operate. When I first saw the videos of the announcement of the successful conduct of the experiments I was very skeptical but when I learned that members of the Swedish Skeptics Society and the Swedish Royal Academy of Sciences witnessed its operation and they came away convinced that the apparatus worked as advertised and that it was producing energy by way of some nuclear reaction it piqued my interest.

For what it’s worth, I am just a simple mechanical engineer that knows how to apply the first and second laws of thermodynamics and after looking at the data for a number of Rossi’s experiments I am convinced his device is working and is of value. I am also convinced that it is using a non-chemical means of producing energy, that there is no slight of hand involved, that the inventor, while he is a bit eccentric and more of an Edisonian type of inventor rather than scientist, is honestly working to market a practical CF/LENR device to businesses. Dr. Rossi is self-financed and refuses to take money from investors. He is selling the devices packaged in One-Megawatt steam generator units at $2 million each. He has reportedly sold fourteen such units. In the face of the hostility of the academic field to CF/LENR over the past two decades Dr. Rossi has concluded that the only practical route to its introduction is to simply sell the product and let the market decide.

There is mystery and controversy surrounding Dr. Rossi as he had trouble with the law in the past (he was acquitted of the charges), he ignores requests for more scientific testing of his device as he believes it is a waste of time (I am convinced he is correct in that). He is as open as he can be about what he is doing but cannot gain a patent on the device at present and so must sell them in the form of a black-box to those entities that are trustworthy and capable of testing the device before purchasing.

The potential is tremendous but the path at present is very difficult. I believe we are on the cusp of a transformation for the better for the entire world. This will produce a transformation as dramatic as the introduction of the steam engine or the diode. Imagine the world without nuclear fission, coal, or natural gas power plants, no need for long transmission lines (possibly none at all) and a dramatic decline in the need for oil. Imagine an essentially pollution free device that emits no greenhouse gases and produces energy at one cent per kilo-watt-hour allowing the desalinization of sea water, the total separation of waste, the remediation of waste sites and even holds out promises to perform the transmutation of hot nuclear waste into benign atomic forms. Aircraft would no longer need to carry flammable fuel, home power units would allow energy independence, and finally wars over oil need no longer be fought. I hope the seemingly utopian perspective allowed does not throw you off.

So, why you might ask yourself, do I need to be involved in pushing this agenda? Firstly, we have invaded other countries for the sake of maintaining the status quo and as a result many have died. But there would have been no need if the discussion and research were done twenty years ago. Secondly, we are suffering an economic depression at the lower economic ranks but an economic boom at the higher wealth levels and this development will overturn much of that. Lastly, we are suffering from lack of academic freedom as attested by the freeze-out of this subject. By compelling academia to face their failure perhaps it will open the door to greater discoveries.

Dr. Rossi is attempting to work from the top down with his commercial approach to the introduction of CF/LENR. But a second prong should be used in the attack if a real revolution is to be achieved and that needs to come from the grass roots upward. This subject needs to be addressed in the open and dramatic format that only a film can deliver. I cannot imagine this subject and an investigation into the recent event of the E-Cat being fairly addressed in even single two hour episode. But if done well, an audience can be kept riveted to the subject and in the end informed as to what the future looks like should they choose to reach out and embrace it.

As I have said earlier, be warned that you are about to open a Pandora’s box of trouble, as you are dealing with human beasts at their lowest state who are presenting a full plumage display of their vanity, conceitedness, arrogance, and fear with its attendant hatred of the unknown and those who dare to speak truth to power.

Sincerely,

Kelley Trezise, a.k.a. Steve Robb, a.k.a. Zedshort

Here is the Sixty Minutes treatment of the subject:
Part One:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SE1gXIsRc_Y&feature=results_video&playnext=1&list=PL0453F9762AC972CD
Part Two: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anXa8f0dhjI&feature=results_video&playnext=1&list=PL0453F9762AC972CD

Here is the first of a series of eight videos entitled “What Ever Happened to Cold Fusion?”:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtweR_qGHEc&feature=related

Here is the first of three videos of Dr. Robert Duncan at the Missouri Energy Summit 2009:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgRiTphJRkg&feature=BFa&list=PL053B99F7BFECBBD9&lf=results_video