Marcus Aurelius: If you believe for even a moment that nickel can be fused into copper at low energies, I have a great bridge I can sell you.

That's would be completely useless. Well, unless it's made of nickel.

fark me, this shiat again? Do we really have to do this ritual every three years or so? Cold fusion, again. And again, it will not work.

KyngNothing: Does this "mysterious catalyst" happen to be a bluish fluid with a small electrical current?

// sounds like electrolysis to me

More of a whitish fluid, produces some minor current until it dries up. Infinite supply.

Well, I guess I'd better invest in nickel futures then.

I'll make a note of it on Nelson's calendar.

I want to believe ...

Usually the first time I hear about a socially revolutionary scientific breakthrough, it's on Forbes.com

Marcus Aurelius: If you believe for even a moment that nickel can be fused into copper at low energies, I have a great bridge I can sell you.

It depends entirely on the catalyst. That's the key component that nobody wants to talk about. If you get creative with some super-dense, unstable elements, given enough complicated math, you can "fuse" just about anything you want -- you could even potentially generate energy from the process.

The question is, how much energy went into creating that catalyst? How much of a net loss are you talking about? Where did that input energy come from?

In theory, it's all quite possible... but it's also almost certainly a net loss of energy. Any way you twist it, though, the steampunk community is bound to be happy.

FTA: The reaction uses a secret catalyst to transform nickel into copper with heat being produced which can be used to make steam, drive a Stirling engine, or be used for whatever you please.

When I hear the term "secret catalyst" I get pretttttyyyy suspicious

Sun Worshiping Dog Launcher: fark me, this shiat again? Do we really have to do this ritual every three years or so? Cold fusion, again. And again, it will not work.

It will work, because Val Kilmer isn't going to let some Russian a-hole get in the way!

Here's the Wikipedia article for people like me who didn't know this existed until today:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_Catalyzer

slayer199: I've been saying for years that the U.S. needs to back a "Man on the Moon" type initiative for cheap and clean energy. This type of thing would be a real game changer...but I doubt I'll see it in my lifetime.

The problem is you really need an extraordinary moment, an almost perfect combination of circumstances for it to happen. What still enrages me 20 years later is we almost had the window of opportunity. If George H.W. Bush had had the vision and guts in 1991 then perhaps we'd be looking at a dramatically different world today. Right after the ground war he should have gone on national tv and said, "Many claim we fought this war over oil. They're right, but for the wrong reasons. This wasn't about protecting my buddies in the oil industry, this was about keeping a murderous asshole from getting control of more than a third of the world's oil supply and using it to fark us and the rest of the world. We need to prevent this possibility from happening again. We do this by ending the world's reliance on fossil fuels through an aggressive, multi-pronged effort directed towards conservation and developing renewable fuels. It's time for our Moon shot, our Marshall Plan. It's time to tell all those billionaire Saudi princes who are subsidizing terrorism around the world that they better start investing their money wisely because we're about to make all that oil worth less than the sand sitting on top of it."

He had the right moment (89% approval rating) and he was the right "against-type" person for it -- oilman (think Nixon & China). It would have given him a strong counter against Clinton in 1992. He just didn't have the guts and vision.

Wow, same date as the Sword of the Stars II release, I can't decide which to view. Not.

The E-Cat claims to fuse Nickle. Last time I checked nuclear fusion of iron of heavier was at an energy loss.

Bunnyhat: Okay, but couldn't you use it to solve the problems of say renewable energy?

We can build giant solar plants out in the desert, but they're useless unless we also build huge power lines to cities and we're also unable to store the power very well. But couldn't we use the solar energy to produce the most efficient catalyst available and use it as fuel in whatever process?

Sure... but, if you're going to go to that much trouble, why not just use the energy for hydrolysis and run everything on hydrogen?

Really Fark?

The E-Cat claims to fuse Nickle. Last time I checked nuclear fusion of iron or heavier was at an energy loss.

//Damn keyboard

Right, nickel to copper requires an energy input, as the binding energy per nucleon in copper is higher.

Gwendolyn: If it were real the energy overlords would have had him assassinated and all the tech destroyed in a huge "accident" before it got to the testing stage.

everyone knows the energy overloards steal these technologies and stow them away for later use

/don't worry about the oil drying up
//they already have the answer waiting in a warehouse in AZ

"Self-sustaining"
"Secret catalyst"

My bullshiat meter just about exploded.

IrateShadow: "Self-sustaining"
"Secret catalyst"

My bullshiat meter just about exploded.

The catalyst is gullibility.

impaler: "Low Energy Nuclear Reaction" (which appears to be the same thing as CF but a less contentious phrasing)

Yes, a phrase with "nuclear reaction" is less contentious than "cold fusion."

Yes, because nuclear reactions actually work and are a real thing. It would be less contentious to say that your energy comes from burning coal than from burning unicorn turds too.

The wiki page is pretty interesting.

It's not 'infinite' power. The device is simply outputting more power than it's taking in. It's still requiring raw materials. Apparently it uses nickel dust and water, and after one of the tests, 10% of the powder had turned to nickel, and another 10% turned into iron.

I would like to know more, but it's hard to believe this is a complete fraud based on the vast number of tests and the credentials of those who attended and are invovled.

an auto fapping computer?
DNRTFA

You know, if columnists for Forbes are this incapable of spotting an obvious scam, it explains a lot about why the world is in the shape it's in.

BunkyBrewman: From the E-Cat website:

Getting Ready for The Rossi Energy Catalyzer - A Low Energy Nuclear Reactor

But, but... it's a NUCLEAR REACTOR!!!

/have no idea whether this is a scam, or not
//but, it's a NUCLEAR REACTOR!!! THREE MILE ISLAND ZOMG!!!

I'll save you the trouble of finding out - it's a scam. It won't be the first time some unknown person has claimed to come up with an "infinite energy" machine, and it won't be the last. Fusion energy (not cold-fusion) might eventually make up a good proportion of our energy needs, but it will still be expensive to run, so anyone promising "free" energy is selling you crap.

No way this will be allowed to come to fruition even if it was real. I mean, we can't even legalize cannabis due to the entrenched interests at large. I want to believe.

Cheap energy? The Republicans are going to hate it. Especially once they find out that the secret catalyst is a mash of aborted fetuses.