Fw: Cool fusion and the engine that runs on Mountain Dew

Danny Yavuzkurt (ayavuzk@fas.harvard.edu)
Mon, 3 May 1999 14:33:39 -0400

Take a look at this one.. thoughts, anyone?..

-Danny



From: Declan McCullagh <declan@well.com> To: <politech@vorlon.mit.edu>
Sent: Monday, May 03, 1999 8:40 AM
Subject: FC: Cool fusion and the engine that runs on Mountain Dew

> http://www.wired.com/news/news/technology/story/19446.html
>
> Energy, Physics, and Soda Pop
> by Declan McCullagh
> 3:00 a.m. 3.May.99.PDT
> BETHESDA, Maryland -- David Wallman deftly slides the dark glass
> shield into place in front of his carbon-arc machine and tells his
> audience to step away. "Don't look directly at it from the side,"
> Wallman warns.
>
> He flips a switch. The light is blinding. The machine begins to bubble
> and froth as 40 amps of current leap the gap between two carbon rods
> and electrify the sugar water that fills the tank.
>
> Those very special bubbles -- Wallman calls them carbo-hydrogen gas --
> will, he hopes, change the world.
>
> When burned, the gas produces much less pollution than gasoline, and
> it may prove cheaper to manufacture. The former Hewlett-Packard
> electrical engineer rattles off a laundry list of possible uses by
> consumers and industry. A clean new fuel for cars. Revolutionary power
> generation. A supplement to solar panels for remote homesteaders.
>
> But the most intriguing result of Wallman's demonstration is that it
> seems to violate the laws of physics by generating more energy than it
> consumes.
>
> As any college chemistry student knows, that should be impossible.
> Your car's internal combustion engine wastes about three-quarters of
> the energy in the fuel it burns when you drive down the road. And it
> guzzles even more when you step on the gas. It never, ever creates
> more energy.
>
> If Wallman's calculations are correct, the only explanation is that
> some form of a small-scale nuclear reaction is taking place inside
> that bubbling tank.
>
> Serious scientists have admitted they can't explain the results in any
> other way, especially the presence of helium in the gas -- an element
> that didn't exist in the sugar-water solution. If it works, Wallman's
> process would not quite be cold fusion, since the temperatures in that
> brilliant carbon arc reach 7,200° F. Perhaps it's cool fusion instead.
>
> Wallman is one of a legion of garage researchers who gathered Saturday
> in a ramshackle Holiday Inn in Bethesda, Maryland, at the first
> Conference on Future Energy. Some presenters are careful engineers
> hoping to attract investors. Others ooze the unwholesome patina of
> snake-oil salesman hoping to make a fast buck. Cold fusion advocates
> hope vindication is finally about to arrive. All believe the media,
> government, and academia ignore, either accidentally or deliberately,
> honest-to-goodness scientific advances.
>
> [...remainder snipped...]
>
>
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