There has been a bit of buzz lately about an Italian named Andrea Rossi (who seems to have previously been associated with some sort of thermal deploymerisation scheme) claiming to have invented a machine that generates energy using a nickel based cold fusion process. Kjell Alekelett has a brief post on the subject - The sun, Rossi’s ”energy catalyzer” and the “neutron barometer”. There is a reasonably long video on Rossi and co at YouTube - Nickel Hydrogen Reactors After Twenty Two Years of Experimental Progress.

One hundred years ago the sun’s source of energy was a complete mystery. The famous professor Svante Arrhenius is said to have asserted that the sun’s energy output could not be due to combustion and that there was no other explanation. Today our knowledge of physics allows us to explain why the sun can radiate energy for millions of years – hydrogen is transformed to helium. Regarding Rossi’s ”energy catalyzer” there are assertions and facts. If we combine these assertions and facts there is no known physics that can explain the amount of energy released the way the experiment is presented. It is asserted that nickel is transformed into copper and if so the energy can be released, but a transformation requires that the atomic nucleus in nickel is transformed into the atomic nucleus of copper. This transformation can be performed in a physics laboratory and is nothing remarkable. We ourselves have done similar reactions for many years and we know the conditions required. To use a hydrogen nucleus to transform nickel into copper requires a particle accelerator that can give the hydrogen nucleus energy sufficient to approach a nickel nucleus close enough for absorption. Putting nickel and hydrogen in a tube under pressure as described by Rossi does not create the conditions required for this nuclear reaction.

We know from Einstein’s equation that mass can be transformed into energy and if we compare the combined mass of a nickel nucleus and a hydrogen nucleus then we see that it is greater than that of copper. The energy that this difference in mass represents could explain the energy released in Rossi’s catalyzer. The only thing we know with certainty is that there must be a physical explanation for the catalyzer’s energy output. One hundred years ago it was possible to state that the sun is radiating more energy than could, at that time, be explained. Despite their ignorance of nuclear physics the scientists of that time could, nevertheless, make measurements to support that statement. As scientists we are naturally frustrated that we are not allowed to know all the details of Rossi’s experiment. Validation of a scientific discovery requires that an experimental phenomenon be reproducible by others when they are told how to perform the experiment. Verification and explanation are the next two important steps that must now be taken.

You probably think that 4700 watts of clean, radiation-free power from a three cubic inch reactor sounds like yet another impossible hoax. But this was a third iteration demo, designed to satisfy skeptics of two previous demonstration at the prestigious University of Bologna. Attending the third demo were two Swedish scientists. One was chairman of the Swedish Skeptics Society and the other was chairman of the Energy Committee of the Swedish Royal Academy of Science. They were both allowed to freely examine the entire setup except for the contents of the tiny, 50cc reactor chamber.

Their written report ended with: “Any chemical process for producing 25 kWh from any fuel in a 50 cm3 container can be ruled out. The only alternative explanation is that there is some kind of a nuclear process that gives rise to the measured energy production.” They also noted that you would have to burn 3 liters of oil to produce 25 kWh. There has since been another confirmation.

The inventor, Adrian Rossi, is very accessible on his blog and has said that more than one hundred of his 4.4 kW reactors are running in four countries. He plans to ship a larger unit in October that produces one MW of hot water. It consists of hundreds of the small reactors in series/parallel mounted in one 2 X 3 X 3 meter box. It weighs two tons. The proprietary nanopowdered nickel fuel will be replenished every six months. Everything has been financed using Rossi’s own money and the customer will pay only when satisfied.

Rossi is an inventor and businessman who decades ago noticed excess heat effects while working with a nickel catalyst to synthesize fuel from hydrogen and carbon monoxide. Using Edison-like experimental techniques, he soon learned to control the heat production. He even kept his factory heated for two years with a prototype reactor. More than two thousand prototypes were built and destroyed in refining the design and learning how to control and scale up the reaction.

Researching the science literature, Rossi soon found Dr Sergio Focardi of the University of Bologna, who had regularly published work on nickel-hydrogen reactors since 1994. Using his own money, Rossi contracted with Dr. Focardi and the university to help him understand and develop the technology as a product. By January 14, 2011 they were ready for a public demonstration of a 10 kilowatt desktop reactor.

The press reaction was muted in Europe and nonexistent in the U.S. Skeptics accused him of hiding a battery inside the reactor so another, longer, demonstration was held, using calorimetry that heated but didn’t boil water to answer other critics. The 18 hour demonstration produced 18 kilowatts average over the entire 18 hours. The U.S. press was still silent and skeptics were still suspicious so two more demos were held.

Still, the silence from the U.S. media was deafening. Rossi announced that there will be no more demonstrations until October 2011, when the million watt heating plant will be shipped to a customer in Greece. If he succeeds, be prepared for a repeat of the Sputnik shock of 1957 when the US woke up to find that they had fallen way behind in science.

Nickel is plentiful and cheap and so is hydrogen in the tiny amounts used. Nickel is so plentiful that energy becomes virtually free. Rossi’s reactor is very simple in principle. Powdered nickel and a catalyst are simply heated to about six hundred degrees centigrade in a stainless steel chamber filled with pressurized hydrogen. At a certain point, the gradual heating starts accelerating due to nuclear reactions in the metal lattice. The heating resistor is backed off to keep the reaction going at a steady state, with about 15 times more heat output than input. Much higher ratios are possible but can be unstable and dangerous. This is why the 1-MW plant will be built using hundreds of smaller modules.

The reactor is enclosed in a lead shield because some radiation is, unpredictably, produced during operation. However, the spent fuel is not radioactive but contains copper that has transmuted from nickel in the nuclear reaction. The lack of dangerous radiation drives hot fusion experts crazy, but clearly there are things happening that are not covered by the equations used in hot fusion. Obviously, quantum mechanics needs to be rethought to include these reactions. ...

The Fleischmann-Pons announcement should have been the start of a new era of cheap, clean energy that would have saved us from the financial and environmental disasters and wars caused by fossil fuel energy. Instead, denial and dirty tricks caused us to waste 23 years and tens of billions of dollars on failed nuclear projects as though nothing had happened. The Presidents 2012 budget includes $2.5 billion for such projects. The first DEMO hot fusion plant is currently scheduled for 2033.

A surprising natural process was discovered in 1989 that can provide us with clean, essentially free energy. It clearly conflicts with the current consensus understanding of quantum mechanics that works nicely for hot fusion reactions. It seems reasonable to try to improve the theory to accommodate this new reality, but denial has instead tricked many good scientists to try to “shoot the messenger.”

The time has come to admit the mistake and get busy trying to improve our understanding so that we can perfect this amazing new technology. We have spent $20 billion and 55 years trying to reach break-even with hot fusion. Time to give cold fusion a chance.

There have been many painful scientific battles in the past over paradigm changes, but truth has a way of prevailing eventually. Cold fusion work has continued under the radar using the more accurate term “Low Energy Nuclear Reactions” (LENR.) Shunned by the establishment, supporters of LENR have created their own journals and meetings. Much progress has been made.

The reasons for the initial difficulty in replication of excess heat have been identified and the amount of excess heat has increased. By 1995 there were 21 published replications showing excess heat of up to 205 watts. Strangely, the press lost interest after the initial media circus. The media’s face-saving denial has left most people with the impression that cold fusion is still dead. In 2009, 60 Minutes broke the silence and did an excellent update. But the rest of the media simply ignored it and focused instead on less risky reports on newsworthy items like rising gasoline prices.

Annual conferences have continued. A weeklong working demo of LENR was included at the tenth ICCF conference, which was held in 2003 at MIT. The power output was 2.3 times the power in. The most recent meeting was held in San Francisco in 2011 under the auspices of the American Chemical Society. The number of presenters at this meeting have quadrupled since 2007. The results this year were so enthusiastic that the American Institute of Physics refused to publish the 370 page proceedings. The cancellation of the publication contract was a last minute decision, clearly ordered by someone at a high level. This attempted blackout of a new technology will backfire in the long run as results get stronger and stronger.

By using nickel and ordinary hydrogen, several researchers have significantly increased energy output and reduced costs. In 1992, Thermacore, a U.S. military contractor ran a cell for nearly a year with a 50 Watt output and 3X excess energy. In 1996 Dr. Sergio Focardi of the University of Bologna in Italy described an experiment using nickel & hydrogen that produced an average excess power output of 39 watts continuously for 278 days. There are a dozen competing theories to explain how nuclear reactions can produce so much energy without emitting dangerous radiation. Theories are helpful but not necessary. We still don’t really know how permanent magnets work, yet we use them every day. Practical applications can be developed experimentally, just as Edison developed the light bulb.

Now that Rossi and Focardi have shown what can be done, expect to see a flurry of new announcements. New technologies tend to take forever to totally debug, so it won’t be surprising if the October delivery is delayed. There are several other companies such as Lattice Energy LLC, Blacklight Power, Brillouin Energy, and Energetics, who have announced product plans to the press and then gone silent.

Silence is not necessarily a bad sign, as the Bloom Box demonstrated. My bet is that we will have some amazing surprises within a year that will be a wake-up call, just as Russia’s Sputnik launch was in 1954. This moment could have come ten years ago if only we had listened to Fleishman and Pons in 1989.

Some excellent videos to watch: 60 Minutes, one hour movie.

TOD ANZ has a post including some videos of peak oil talks delivered in Australia recently - Kjell Aleklett & Phil Hart - Peak Oil Presentation Videos.

On 24th November last year, Beyond Zero Emissions and GAMUT (Australasian Centre for the Governance and Management of Urban Transport) held a peak oil evening with the visiting Professor and ASPO President Kjell Aleklett. I also spoke following Kjell, concentrating more on Australian factors and cultural aspects of peak oil since Prof Aleklett had already overwhelmed the audience with the technical aspects!

The SMH has an article on ASPO President Kjell Aleklett's Australian tour, looking at global warming scenarios considering peak oil and quoting ASPO Australia and TOD ANZ's Phil Hart - Emissions scenarios are based on flawed assumptions, says energy expert.

The concept of a peak - maximum production - does not mean a date after which the world soon runs out of fossil fuels. It's about flow rates. ''We are not running out,'' says Aleklett. ''But we have a limit to supply. What we're running out of is the possibility of increased usage.''

Aleklett, a long-time critic of the International Energy Agency's forecasts, is looking increasingly on the money as demand figures have been wound back in the IEA's 2010 World Energy Outlook, released this month.

The IEA stopped short of calling a peak in oil production but did lower its consumption forecasts.

In 2009, the IEA stressed the importance of oil for economic growth and concluded that 106 million barrels a day (mb/d) would be required by 2030, about 20mb/d higher than today. In 2010, the IEA only predicts 99mb/d by 2035 and avoids any discussion of economic growth.

''We can interpret this as meaning desired economic growth is not possible,'' says Aleklett. He means it.

Aleklett believes high oil prices - they peaked at $US147 in 2008 - helped trigger the global financial crisis, when oil-dependent home owners in the outer suburbs of America's cities began defaulting on their loans.

Peak oil will limit economic growth: the IEA now sees OECD oil consumption falling 15 per cent by 2035. OECD nations, including Australia, will have to revise down their consumption estimates. The Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics has yet to bring its forecasts into line with the IEA. But Australia's oil production is declining rapidly - by the end of the decade we could be reliant on imports for 80 per cent of consumption, says former Shell Australia and Australian Coal Association executive Ian Dunlop.

Where will that oil come from? Can we outbid the likes of China and India?

''The government's assumption there will always be oil available on the market is nonsense, unless we're willing to pay a fortune,'' says Dunlop.

BHP Billiton's latest quarterly crude oil production figures showed drops across the board, year-on-year, propped up only by the new Pyrenees field in Western Australia.

ABARE's Energy Resource Assessment last year listed just two other new Australian oil projects, including Thai operator PTTEP's Montara/Skua field - site of last year's disastrous spill, which the government finally responded to this week.

Local ASPO spokesman Phil Hart says ABARE is in ''economic fairyland'', believing demand will always lead to supply. The same problem underpins the IPCC's scenarios, which are modelled by economists who ''assume business as usual is possible''.

Ultimately it is irrelevant whether we have enough fossil fuels to hit 6 degrees of warming. Global temperatures are already too high at 0.8 degrees above pre-industrial levels, and climate change is already dangerous. Recent Potsdam Institute analysis concluded 75 per cent of the world's fossil fuel reserves must be left in the ground if we are to keep warming to 2 degrees.

''There's more than enough coal, oil and gas to get us into trouble,'' says Hart. We need to stop burning fossil fuels now (and, the implication is, avoid wasting billions on carbon capture and storage, which uses extra energy and will only accelerate resource depletion) in favour of renewables.

The ramifications are profound, particularly for infrastructure spending: we need to electrify transport, and shift from private to public transport. Aviation may be a sunset industry. No more toll roads with wildly optimistic demand projections. No more hideously expensive airports.

Aleklett says politicians should welcome the concept of peak oil. ''Peak oil should be politicians' best friend,'' he says. ''It is something they cannot fix.''

Energy Bulletin has a post from ASPO's Kjell Aleklett on Iraqi oil reserves which has some interesting observations, though I still think the numbers being quoted are too pessimistic - Iraq’s oil and the future.

Wednesday the 13th of November will be a day to remember. For a number of hours I and my research group had the opportunity to discuss Iraq’s oil in detail with Dr Issam A. R. al-Chalabi. He has worked in Iraq’s oil industry for 23 years and has been chairman for SCOP, the State Company for Oil Projects, the chairman of INOC, the Iraq National Oil Company, as well as Iraq’s vice-oil minister and oil minister. At the time of war in Kuwait he was dismissed and moved to Jordan. Few people can have a better knowledge of Iraq’s oil.

Jean Laherrere, the former head of exploration for Total, has made a summary of the oil discoveries in Iraq. It shows that during the years that Dr al-Chalabi had leading positions in Iraq their discoveries increased from 70 to 140 billion barrels. Today, Iraq is reported to have 115 billion barrels in its reserves. Our conversation began with a discussion of the size of these reserves. Are there “political barrels” in the reserves and how had they arrived at the figure of 115 billion barrels?

In 1968 the decision was made to hold Iraq’s oil reserve figures secret, but during his time Dr al-Chalabi worked to have them openly accounted. He asserted that during the years that he was responsible for Iraq’s reserve figures there was not a single time that Saddam Hussein had ordered him to report these in any way to suit a political purpose.

The precondition for finding oil is suitable geological structures. In Iraq there are 525 of these to investigate. Obviously they have chosen the most promising structures to investigate first. To date they have studied 125 of these. When Dr al-Chalabi was responsible for this activity Iraq had 40 seismological teams and 30 to 40 teams drilling for oil. The seismological investigations were all of a 2D nature. The first opportunity he had to introduce 3D equipment was in 1990, just before he was removed. Dr al-Chalabi considers that Iraq is still virgin territory in terms of exploration. An exploration well, a so-called “wildcat”, can either be dry or can hit oil. He said that they had been very successful and that 73 % of the wells that they drilled had resulted in new finds, a fantastic success rate that is probably among the world’s best. Despite difficult conditions, exploration continued during the eight years of the war with Iran. Iraq also has the right to drill for oil in a small area of the Persian Gulf but so far they have not done so.

In June 1990 a group of geologists and petroleum engineers gathered to assess Iraq’s oil reserves. Geologists are usually optimists and they reported that the reserves should be 140 billion barrels. When the petroleum engineers made a more realistic estimation with, among other things, a recovery factor in the range of 15 to 25 %, they arrived at a figure of 115 billion barrels of oil. Compared with Saudi Arabia that uses a recovery factor of over 50%, that is a very conservative judgement. One reason for the conservative viewpoint is that they only had access to 2D seismological analyses.

In the structures that they have researched they have only drilled shallow wildcats but with modern deep drilling technology Dr al-Chalabi estimates that they will find significantly more oil in the old structures than in all the remaining structures yet to be explored. The figure that was cited was twice as much. With this as a guide and the estimate that they will find an additional 30-60 billion barrels in the old structures we can expect that Iraq has a future potential of 40-60 billion barrels, i.e. a maxiumum of two years of global oil consumption.

Dr al-Chalabi considered that the period spanning 1973 to 1980 was Iraq’s golden age for oil. Then there was money and also peace in Iraq. From Figure 1 we can also see that it was a very successful period. They found, among others, the field “East Bagdad”. In reality, part of Bagdad’s population lives on an oilfield. ...

Oil production figures show that war is an effective way to stop production. The southern part of the field Rumaila lies in Kuwait. This part may amount to 5% of the field’s total area. The question of where exactly the border lies in the desert has been a source of tension. Kuwait decided to begin production from its part of the field before there was an agreement with Iraq. The geological structures are such that, if one pumps out oil in the south it will automatically be refilled from the reservoir in the north – Iraq’s oil was flowing under the border. To counter this a number of oil wells were opened on the Iraqi side of the border. Many assert that the oil production from Rumaila was one of the reasons behind Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait. Today the UN has set the border so that even the wells that earlier lay in Iraq now lie in Kuwait.

In 1979 there were well advanced plans to increase oil production to 6 million barrels per day. War and politics changed these plans drastically. However, the oil is still there in the ground and at the end of the 1980s they began to discuss the old plans again. Once again war and politics put a spanner in the works.

With marginal investments today’s production, (that comes from 18 or 19 fields), could be increased by 4 million barrels per day. With additional investment in new fields the old plans can be realised and Iraq can become a nation with an oil production of 6 million barrels per day. Our calculations are not as optimistic but we certainly do not have all the correct numbers.

We then approached the political part of our discussion. Time and again Dr al-Chalabi brought up Iraq’s law number 80 from 1961 that states that parliamentary approval is needed for foreign companies to obtain ownership rights over oil in Iraq. They are now discussing a new oil law that will transfer the power to make this decision to the government and there is a great deal of opposition to this among the population.

Recently they called for tenders for extraction rights in a number of oil fields. The fact that 125 companies from all over the world expressed their interest shows that Iraq’s oil is decisive for future global production. Dr al-Chalabi does not think that these companies should be responsible for production. He thinks that responsibility should remain in Iraqi hands. Certainly Iraq needs help from service companies and maybe also foreign oil companies but the right to determine over oil production should remain with the people. What is happening now is taking Iraq back to the time just after the first world war. “When one mentions Iraq one thinks of oil and when one mentions oil one thinks of Iraq.” Alan Greenspan, Colin Powell and more and more of those that steered USA’s invasion of Iraq now confess that the war was about oil.

I wrote in a debate article in Uppsala Nya Tidning [Uppsala’s daily newspaper] on 3 October 2002, ”The war that is now being planned against Iraq can be dressed up in whatever suit they wish and made to smell nice with the help of eau de cologne but when you unbutton the jacket it still smells of oil”. I was criticised then for my views but one can see now that I was right.

To conclude we discussed Iraq’s discoveries of natural gas. These are modest compared with the reserves in Iran and Qatar. The discussion quickly moved to the agreement that Shell recently signed with the Iraqi company South Gas. Dr al-Chalabi became very agitated and asserted that Shell, in principle, has obtained a monopoly on gas extraction in Iraq and the price they paid is only a tenth of what may be worth 40 billion dollars in 20 year’s time. He was involved with the construction of the natural gas infrastructure and asserted that the repairs needed are quite limited. Iraq’s people should take care of gas production themselves.

This is part of the information that we received. As a university-based researcher I am very pleased that Dr al-Chalabi thought it was completely OK to report our conversation openly. We will look critical at the numbers, but in terms of future discoveries in Iraq they will probably find many more oil fields. The question is if they will ever find any more supergiants. Adding all supergiants and giants oilfields our list adds up to 27 “elephants”. The world needs the production from these fields. According to Dr. al-Chalabi, the Iraqi government plan to sell out the five supergiants with around 43 billion barrels. In a planned second round they collect most of the rest giant fields with 52 billion barrels. Left over for Iraq will be 115 – 95 = 20 billion barrels. I can understand if Dr. al-Chalabi is upset, as he has been part of the discovery of 70 billion of the barrels that will be on the market.