http://newenergytimes.com/v2/blog/?p=138
This is going to take some work. Krivit is claiming contradiction.
Headline: «
<http://newenergytimes.com/v2/blog/?p=138>McKubre Recalibrates Cold Fusion Data
<http://newenergytimes.com/v2/blog/?p=139>EPRI, Passell Contradict McKubre
Michael McKubre, of SRI International, told
people attending a press conference March 21
that, in 2000, his group had recalibrated one
of the helium values in his cold fusion
research. The original research was carried out in 1994. [...]
http://newenergytimes.com/v2/blog/?p=139
Electrochemist Michael McKubre never reported
corrections to his LENR experiment M4, according
to a representative of the organization that sponsored the research.
Brian Schimmoller, marketing communications lead
with the Electric Power Research Institutes
nuclear division, told New Energy Times today
that no correction to McKubres experiment M4,
described in EPRI report TR-107843-V1, exists.
This contradicts a statement McKubre made to New
Energy Times in a
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qkb9btuKlzs>videotaped
press conference on March 21 at the American
Chemical Society meeting in San Francisco
Do the statements contradict each other? No.
McKubre says that he provided a correction. An
EPRI representative says that "no correction
exists." These two statements are not in
contradiction. Krivit states that McKubre "never
reported corrections, according to" the EPRI rep.
If the EPRI rep says that, I'd wonder how he
knows. McKubre did not say when and how he
reported it to EPRI, but he is explicit about
reporting it at ICCF 8. There are lots of
possibilities. If it was reported late enough,
those files weren't active and EPRI really wasn't
concerned any more. A letter could have been lost. Etc.
The reports were only made public, I think, in the last year.
It is not clear that this correction is at all
material, which McKubre points out, for the two
values are "experimentally the same." I.e., they
do not change the conclusions from those
experiments, and, as McKubre also points out,
he'd have preferred, as far as what he expects,
the lower value, but corrected it to the higher one.
Krivit is attempting to create news, and he's
doing it in pursuit of an agenda, and, to use a technical term, it sucks.
He is trying to impeach the researchers and the
helium/heat data, which is the most convincing of
all the evidence that we have showing a nuclear
process. It is the answer to Huizenga's challenge
(Where is the ash, the "nuclear product"?)
Heat/Helium of 24 MeV is of great interest, but
still 24-48 MeV or so would be "consistent with"
D-D fusion, but other forms of fusion or other
nuclear reactions might do the same, and the
critical information and result, which Hagelstein
covers in his response, is that energy and helium
are correlated. A more exact value may or may not
give us information about the exact reaction
involved, and no single experiment or research
group should be considered to provide us with
conclusive data on the exact value. Storms gives
25 +/- 5 MeV/He4, but I don't think anyone is
insisting that this has been conclusively measured.
It's also quite possible that there is more than
one reaction, and different reactions predominate in different experiments.
(For the uninitiated, if the reaction were D-D
fusion to He-4, 100% branching, with the energy
transferred to the lattice, we would see a Q
value of 24 MeV or higher, depending on how much
of the helium is captured and measured. There is
a theory with some evidence behind it that almost
half of the helium is trapped in the lattice,
unless special efforts are taken to flush it out,
so absent those efforts, we might see up to 48
MeV. It doesn't mean that the reaction is higher energy than 24 MeV.)
Krivit was asking quite an esoteric question, I'm
sure most of the audience was bewildered. I do
have some trouble believing that Hagelstein was
bewildered, though. I'd have answered the
question about transmutation, amateur that I am, like this:
"If there are other reactions present, perhaps
different branching or secondary reactions,
obviously it could affect the energy/helium
ratio, in either direction. However, I'm not
aware of evidence sufficient to come to any firm
conclusions about this. As we should know by now
in this field, isolated reports are not enough.
We have enough to know that the heat/helium
ratio is "consistent with" that expected from
D-D fusion, and that is conclusive evidence that
nuclear reactions are taking place, with some
kind of fusion being the most likely suspect,
but certainly is not proof that the reaction is
simple D-D fusion, and I personally think this
quite unlikely. In fact, 23.8 MeV would not
prove D-D fusion, because there are now a number
of theorists working on cluster fusion, and it's
possible that the minimum cluster, ordinarily,
fuses no less than four deuterons and possibly
more. Does that answer your question, Mr. Krivit?"
Asking questions of the complexity of these at
this press conference was a tad rude. Krivit was
really grandstanding. And it largely worked. His
noisy "conversion" to a critic of the fusion
hypothesis was given the heaviest notice in
reports from this conference. Krivit became the news.
To come to the above conclusions, I transcribed
the Krivit questions and answers from the press
conference and studied it. My transcript of the
copy hosted by NET, as linked above, is below.
Krivit: In case any of you don't know me, this is
Steven Krivit of New Energy Times. I've got a
question for Dr. Marwan. Considering the
mainstream view of cold fusion, and the strong
evidence of LENR, but weak evidence for cold
fusion, isn't promoting this field as cold fusion
just about the worst thing that you could do to gain respect for the field?
Marwan: I don't know what you mean with *weak*
[emphasized word] evidence for cold fusion. (long
pause). I'll repeat myself. I don't know what you
mean *weak* evidence for cold fusion. What brings you up to this opinion?
Krivit[?]: I think we should go on to other questions.
[...]
Krivit: Question for Dr. Hagelstein. When I was
discussing the changed value from SRI Experiment
M4 with Pam Boss, she told me that you or one of
your colleagues explained this correction at one
of the ICCF Conferences. Where can I find some
documentation about [ultimately?] the exact error
as well as the math for that correction?
Hagelstein: Questions about experiment probably
are best addressed to the people that did the
experiment, and I think one of the people that were involved in it is here.
Krivit: Dr. McKubre, when I was discussing the
values -- changed values from SRI Experiment M4
to Pam Boss, she told me that Peter Hagelstein
explained that he or his colleagues explained
this correction. Where can I find some
documentation about both the exact error as well
as the math for that correction?
McKubre: Well, I don't ever remember Peter
[Hagelstein] explaining that. In preliminary
report that we issued to the Electric Power
Research Institute, which was a report private to
the Electric Power Research Institute, but now is
public, contained, I think, a value of the mass
balance for helium-4 and heat which was -- I
think it was, from memory, and this was 16 years
ago, maybe now? -- 85 plus or minus 10 percent.
When we recalibrated the volumes that were
involved in determining that mass balance, the
value became a more correct value, [it] was 105
plus or minus 10 percent. Now, those two values
are experimentally the same. I would actually
prefer the lower values, since you can't get more
product than your reaction produces, but the
correction was observed, reported to the Electric
Power Research Institute, who were the sponsors
of that work, and I also made a comment about it
in the Conference in Larici in the year 2000,
ICCF 8, during my presentation. So, the published
value, the first published value, was in the
Conference Proceedings, and the first published
value contained the correct value of that mass
balance, 105 plus or minus 10 percent. Is that
the information you were looking for?
[...]
Krivit: Question for Dr. Hagelstein. Doesn't the
experimental evidence of isotopic shifts in D-Pd
experiments, because of their energy releases,
disprove the idea of D + D cold fusion with a total 24 MeV of heat?
Hagelstein: I'm gonna have a tough time in
understanding and interpreting that particular
question. The evidence and support, of helium
associated with energy production in the
Fleischmann-Pons experiment, is that helium-4
*is* seen in association with excess power, [and]
comes from a number of experiments, more than ten
experiments, where people have seen that kind of
thing. There [are] two measurements, where the
correlation shows a Q value, or an energy per
helium-4, about 24 MeV. In experiments that show
transmutation, the question is, are they similar
experiments or not? For example, some of the
claims have been made for light water
experiments, rather than heavy water experiments.
As for me, except for a small number of
measurements produced by my colleague George
Miley and experiments of Dash and the SPAWAR
group showing some elemental anomalies, I'm not
actually familiar with evidence that I believe
in, at this point, showing transmutation
correlated with energy production. I don't know
that it doesn't exist, I don't know that it does
exist. I think the experimental situation at this
point is unclear. In any event, I don't actually
believe that the results from such light water
experiments causes one to doubt the results from
heavy water experiments. I basically don't
understand the logic associated with your question.
Krivit: That wasn't actually my question, my
question was D-Pd systems, with deuterium. I have
a report of a neutron activation analysis from a
Fleischmann-Pons system, performed at the
University of Texas, which showed transmutations,
isotopic shifts. Are you familiar with this one?
It's "Trace elements added to palladium by
electrolysis in heavy water." It introduces about 10 MeV.
Hagelstein: Who is the author or group?
Krivit: Here is your copy.
[Hagelstein glances at the paper, looks back and
forth, no more response is shown, video fades out.]
----------------
One of the EPRI papers has the title Krivit gave,
and he hosts a copy of it, the direct URL is
http://my.epri.com/portal/server.pt?Abstract_id=TP-108743
Krivit's comment that "it introduces about 10
MeV" seems to be about an estimate in the paper
of what might be contributed to energy by fission
of Pd-108, per atom of Pd-108 lost, this was not
an experimental result. How this would affect the
overall heat/helium ratio is radically unclear,
since helium wasn't reported. If Pd fission was
taking place, whether caused by neutron
absorption or through secondary reactions or
through BEC fusion with palladium, the effect
this would have on the heat/helium ratio would
depend on how common the fission was compared to
whatever is producing helium. The 10 MeV figure
in the paper is *not* the contribution expected
from this fission to heat/helium ratio. Krivit
thinks the paper is saying something that it isn't.
The investigators were Bush and Lagowski.
