What Exactly Is Rossi’s “Mme Curie” Reactor — A Direct Source of Electricity?

Ever since Andrea Rossi announced a breakthrough with a new version of the Hot Cat yesterday, there have been quite a number of questions put to him on the Journal of Nuclear Physics about just what it is, and what it does. So far we are getting a somewhat unclear picture, but there are some clues that can be gleaned from some of Rossi’s comments. Here are some examples form over the last 24 hours (August 9-10, 2015)

Q: Is it correct to now make a distinction between the ‘traditional’ Hot Cat and the “M.me Curie”?

The ‘traditional’ Hot Cat could be useful for industrial application, including driving steam turbines?

The “M.me Curie”, something new, different, not industrial?

A: Yes, it is correct.

Q: Are you saying that the new Hot-Cat is NOT suitable for generating electricity via steam turbines or that it is suitable for electricity generation via turbines?

A: While the Hot cat and the LT E-Cat will be destined to industrial applications, the “M.me Curie” will be destined to a completely different kind of utilization, very much popular.

Q: is your hope that the new Hot Cat will eventually be able to:

a) Provide electricity for domestic use
b) Provide heat for domestic use
c) Both

A: It is too soon to answer, let us make our R&D on it. While LT E-Cat and Hot Cat have been tested for years, the new born is just making the first steps. This time, when we will explain it, there will not pass much time before the distribution. No more mambojumbo-tango.
Warm Regards,
A.R.

Q: I have the acute feeling that you are technically ready with the 1Mw plant, being your efforts dedicated to tune the direct electricity E-Cat generator.

A: You are not wrong, but I must repeat my mantric disclaimer: the final results could be positive, but also negative. About the direct production, I have news related to the new Hot Cat, named “M.me Curie”.
I am working with it, it is a real revolution. Is important. Works very strongly and I am very optimist. Now we must test its duration. The performance is very interesting. I want to be clear: it is too soon to give data, it could have problems, but what I am seeing now is very, very, very good. It could be the leader for the very massive production. We will go directly from our tests to the market. If what I am seeing now goes on, in October will be tried the safety certification. I am like a coach of tennis that looks at a kid 4 years old playing and says: ” this is the future Federer”. Big , big hope

Q: Did you change the reactant mix from the last run to optimize direct electric production?

A: Yes.

Rossi seems very excited about the Mme. Curie reactor, and he’s put out some decent hints here. When he says it will be “completely different” and “very much popular”, I think that points towards it NOT being just a heater (which is what all E-Cats have been so far), but something that produces electricity directly. That really would be the killer app for the E-Cat, especially if electricity could be generated in one’s home, off-grid.

As exciting as this all sounds, I think we will have to be patient with this. Rossi has talked about getting it into certification testing by October, but certification for domestic E-Cats has taken years so far, and we don’t see anything on the market yet for domestic use. I would anticipate that if this is a brand new technology quite a lot of safety testing would be needed to ensure that this product would be safe to be used in homes.