May
8
An Update on Andrea Rossi and the E-Cat
May 8, 2013 | 18 Comments
Yesterday Sterling D. Allan of PESN and Frank Acland of E-CatWorld conducted a one and a half hour interview with Andrea Rossi hosted by Gary Hendershot on his SmartScarecrow service regarding developments in the E-Cat technology based on the cold fusion technology called “LENR” for Low Energy Nuclear Reaction.
SmartScarecrow has chat room where people could post questions, several of which were presented to Rossi during the show. At its peak, there were just over 1000 people listening to the live broadcast, which began at 4:30 pm Eastern time (GMT-5), with nearly 200 people in the live chat.
The conversation while on YouTube is audio only. Rather than sit through over an hour and half here is a brief summary.
What Rossi and the enthusiasts have learned is its a very long path from the lab demonstration unit to production. Mr. Rossi’s credibility has taken quite hit from observers without familiarity in making such a jump. Every little glitch in the scaling that fails has to be worked back, discovered, redesigned or engineered and then the process starts in again.
To build the 1-megawatt unit takes 106 reactors, so getting each one built is quite an undertaking for a startup. Meanwhile the company is well, starting up, getting located, equipped, supplied, staffed and all the myriad details to build something. Days means weeks and weeks could be months adding up to years.
Loaded E-Cat for Transport. Click image for the largest view.
The very first unit experienced just these kinds of problems and wasn’t in fact actually shipped; a second unit with the results of the experience from the first build is what was delivered to the U.S. military customer.
Currently, a unit that was built for delivery has just been shipped after a test suite was run. Shipping for the container-sized unit would be almost a month and simply installing the unit will take a month as well.
That puts two 1 megawatt units out the door.
Understandably, with all the outside attention the customers have no intention of public acknowledgment of the deal, delivery or results. Quiet is the word – no one wants onlookers hanging around and the attention on a very technical and controversial device.
The next important point is safety. This is new technology with all the enthusiasm comes novelty and inexperience. The E-Cat gets hot, very hot, past the temperature of boiling water and there are 106 of them in a smallish box. It’s not something the untrained need to be near.
These points also have thrown the brakes on consumer-sized units. The certification and safety agencies that need to sign off on something like this require extensive testing before they will approve it to be made available to the general public. It would seem the famed UL Laboratories attempt is on hold. That makes sense, as the UL isn’t holding a protocol in the files for the testing. Something has to be built up and the experience needed is sparse at best – missing as a practical matter – for any protocol at all.
Mr. Rossi is getting data and did say that these plants consume only 1 gram of Nickel for every 23 gigawatt-hours of heat they produce.
There is also a hotter running model called the “Hot-Cat”. The Hot-Cat runs at 350ºC and Mr. Rossi said it is “very stable.” At this temperature, he said that creating electricity will be easy, and that they are making progress on building. He also confirmed that the European based world wide operating firm Siemens is still working with his firm to generate electricity.
Hot-Cat Testing to Destruction. Click image for more info.
The Hot-Cat is garnering attention as well. A test was run back in late March with over 120 hours of continuous no interruption running. The test was run by four professors from different parts of the world, with Mr. Rossi absent, though he was available if they had any questions. The professors used their instrumentation and they controlled the cabling. The group hasn’t provided Mr. Rossi with the exact results but he said, “they were “smiling” and indicated that it was “very good””.
Meanwhile Mr. Rossi is staffing up. The company has 2 specialists working on electronics for the control systems. They have made enormous progress in the last 7-8 months. They also work on any kind of thing connected with electricity.
There are 3 specialists working on thermal technical problems: thermal dynamics, upgrading the heat exchanger and upgrading the energy density. Two specialists are working on design, external aesthetics as well as functionality and space utilization for energy density optimization.
There is a team that makes tests of plants, to run plants; to invent new things that improve efficiency. Plus a manufacturing team and another team working on prototype design in the U.S. (for 1 MW plants).
Perhaps one item of interest to many working on the technology from other ideas is Mr. Rossi’s explanation of how the reactor starts. He explained that each module has essentially two apparatuses inside: and activator and the reactor. He calls the resistive heater element the “mouse” and the reactor the “cat”. It takes a little tease from the mouse getting in front of the cat’s nose for the cat to go off running. He compares this to the little amount of energy required to get the reaction going, using outside electricity to bring the resistive heater up to a temperature that the reaction takes place. Of the two components, the reactor is only “the size of a whiskey bottle”.
For the future Mr. Rossi noted most of the R&D would stay in Italy, but that the rest of the operations are taking place in the U.S. (Florida). At one point in the conversation he talked about the friendliness of Sweden to his company, due to their need for heat and their environmental consciousness. They are in process of developing manufacturing capability there as well.
For many the Rossi E-Cat story is about the news and promotion efforts. That would be quite a story in its own right, but for most of us Mr. Rossi’s progress depends on the ability to attract enough attention to get the edge of the wedge into the market while building up a stronger technology and attracting the world’s best innovative minds to help.
We’re coming up on three years of watching Mr. Rossi. Most any fraud would have fallen apart long ago. What is actually here for the future is getting less cloudy and a bit clearer for our inspection. If you want to gripe – take it to the patent offices – were these bureaucrats helping we’d have a very complete look. Until that happens the game of information release will have to be played to keep the intellectual property secure while luring just enough customers to keep development on track.
However one feels about Mr. Rossi one must respect that he has come quite a long way and looks to be on track for further progress. Your humble writer wishes him God’s Speed and good luck – as he surely needs them.
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“Quiet is the word – no one wants onlookers hanging around and the attention on a very technical and controversial device.”
Hence all the photos and interviews and website postings, of course.
The Ecat-Rossi organization is becoming clearer.
Another important new is the cooperation avec
Siemens, one of mondial specialist of ORC (Organic
Rankine Cycle) exploiting heat between 80-400 oC.
This means that the ThermoElectric E-Cat would be
not too far for every stationary power plants.
So good to hear from Andrea Rossi and the progress and plans he has for the Energy Catalzers. He can install and sell energy directly to the public and industrial customers while maintaining ownership and protection of his devices. jdh
“Understandably, with all the outside attention the customers have no intention of public acknowledgment of the deal, delivery or results. Quiet is the word – no one wants onlookers hanging around and the attention on a very technical and controversial device.”–NEAF
Actually, I don’t understand this at all. What I believe is that there are no customers. Not even a name is provided?
There is also a hotter running model called the “Hot-Cat”. The Hot-Cat runs at 350ºC and Mr. Rossi said it is “very stable.” At this temperature, he said that creating electricity will be easy, and that they are making progress on building.–NEAF
This is a classic switch, done by many with dubious investment schemes. Yes, we cannot deliver on the product we told you about, as there is an even better product we are morphing into…
NEAF reported a couple years back the Rossi was on the cusp. Now we are hearing it is years away, that a new and better product is in the offing, and that the customers are secret. No doubt, the new and better product will take years of dickering, until another newer and product prototype is made that will take years…..
Really, is this credible?
I agree with Benjamin Cole…
I do believe LENR is a real phenomenon, but I am very suspicious about Rossi’s business…
When is Third Party Verification released.
sigh…… Maybe they meant March 2014?
I understand the frustration that people feel about this situation. It’s very hard to just not know if the world will be changed by these developments. To Benjamin Cole I don’t see the classic switch. The low temperature E-CAT is still available and Rossi appears eager to sell the product he has available. So many of the criticisms of Rossi allege some kind of fraud. You can’t invest in his company so defrauding individual investors is not happening. The terms of purchase of an E-CAT are revealing. The purchase price is put in escrow until the purchaser has the E-CAT working to the purchaser’s satisfaction. There doesn’t seem to be much chance for fraud in such an arrangement. I’d like to know if Benjamin Cole thinks that LENR is worth investigating. I read a comment not long ago on another blog and I would like to credit it’s author for the following idea. LENR and E-CATS are not a religion. What we believe about this situation doesn’t really matter. Rossi has written that what really matters is whether he is able deliver and sell products that meet the needs of the people that buy the E-CATS. I think he is right about that and only time will tell what the shape of tomorrow will be.
Nice right up.Thanks.
Nice write up.Thanks.
Jim-
You are comments are valid, but let me pose this question:
Should not the onus be on Rossi to put up or shut up? Not on me to disprove what he has? The only claim I make is that Rossi has not demonstrated his product will work. Not one time.
He says he has a technology to produce electricity. Great. Let’s see it. Bring it on, baby, I would love it.
Suddenly, we hear the whole UL testing promise is dead.
And now, hot cats and cold cats. Maybe tepid cats next.
This is simply not credible. He is taking money from investors, if not the investing public.
With Rossi, LENR is the power source of the future, and always will be.
@ Jim,
Have you ever dealt with investors?
Andrea Rossi has been richer than 99.99% of people in the world. his American Visa was handed to him by The President of the United States. He has owned Formula Racing Cars… He has been very rich.
Did he move to Hawaii and have hula girls sent to his room every night? No. He stayed working. Many people who win a few million retire and live off their wealth. AR had more than 10 times that amount of personal wealth and never quit. He has always loved Environmental science.
He published a book in his 20’s about environmental science.
He has perseverance. In fact; Andrea Rossi held a Guiness Book of World Records running record for several years.
This man has held running records, published books, made and lost and rebuilt fortunes several times. He is to be admired for any of these.
Now this great man claims to be developing a revolutionary new power source and your first instinct is to call him a fraudster?
They will have schools named after this guy and LENR (which has been proven and replicated now elsewhere although not to the extent of AR claims) will save millions of lives through hydration and cleaner air.
I just think its funny to have the “skeptic” stance at this point. It is ridiculous.
Maybe some people think that all that is not serious, saying the businessmen don’t jumt the gold rush…
of course most of them are silent, or playing the fool like rossi…
some are more clear
http://www.lenr-forum.com/showthread.php?1468-New-leap-in-ecosystem-development-with-LENR-Cities-and-LENR-invest-!
their point is not to make reactors, but to accelerate development of applications…
Defkalion strategy is also interesting, yet less visible.
Kwhilborn:
I am not the issue here, whether I am smart or nice guy etc.
The issue is Rossi and joe LENR machines. Do they work?
So far, we have no evidence they do.
This very blog a couple of years back trumpeted that the LENR was right on the cusp. Now we are told it is years and years away.
Rossi’s background is checkered at best.
Not that that matters either–what matters is that he provide even a single machine to credible third party investigators, who plug it in themselves, use it, and then conduct a teardown, all while Rossi is off the premises.
That will never happen.
@ Ben,
My last post was to Jim not you.
Andrea Rossi has brought LENR into the limelight (somewhat) when he spent a year demonstrating his unstable product.
I am sure Andrea Rossi is tossing in his sleep all night overwhelmed by the angst he feels over not convincing you. Rossi cares less about you dude. Sorry but you do’t matter to him.
If you want to see what is going on with LENR then you simply must wait until corporations decide to let people know things or follow some demonstrations by Celani.
Toyota, Mitsubishi, Honda, Nasa, and more have all admitted to and budget LENR R&D.
What is exciting about Rossi is despite the scam scenarios which honestly do not hold up if you read my last post. Your past might be colorful as well if you had a 30 million dollar waste management company eating Mafia Profits IN ITALY. Yes; Italy has a Mafia (who knew?). Maybe read how they took over Waste Management in that country and enlighten yourself. Even Rossis competitors testified on his behalf.The ONLY CHARGE AGAINST ROSSI THAT HELD is tax evasion.
Rossi also had a Visa and could have hid in America but went and faced all his accusers and did it like a man.
I think if Rossi says he has something then he has it. He has no history of lying. So this may be the man who replaces 600 million smog producing cars and tucks off the road and saves millions of lives.
Maybe show some respect instead of your shallow sense of entitlement. If you want proof so bad go and do it yourself.
Why would Rossi care about your wishes? Quit whining and just hope it is true.. Actually we KNOW LENR is true, let’s hope Rossi has tamed it as he claims.
Kwhilbron_
I am disappointed that I am so unimportant to Rossi, but I still say he needs to produce a single working machine verified by others.
Other websites have posted what appears to be fraudulent behavior by Rossi.
LENR—the energy source of the future, now and forever.
So I guess you are now happy that he has provided at least three machines for successful independent verification.
It would appear based on this verification those other websites were wrong..
Hurray for our future
Wow, this is news… Remember “COLD FUSION” and all the Ha Ha’s about LENR (Low Energy Nuclear Fusion)?
Cornell University has just confirmed that Andrea Rossi has a very high output Energy Reactor that works thru the Weak Nuclear Forces. (Transmutation of Metals) They are confirming and writing a Peer Review of their Lab Testing… Rossi has sold reactors here in America and they are currently in use… (Commercial 1 Megawatt Thermo Reactors) This is a game changer that has been suppressed a long time and very controversial in that it breaks the Laws of Physic’s and has been highly criticize by the most influential Academics…
Please Confirm and Report your findings…
Lonnie McVaigh
4929 Weber Road
Corpus Christi, Texas 78411
http://arxiv.org/abs/1305.3913
http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nyteknik.se%2Fnyheter%2Fenergi_miljo%2Fenergi%2Farticle3697489.ece
And here we are, two years later and still nothing but BS. Sure it’s piled wider and deeper but still nothing but, BS.