To continue with the argument that chemical energy from hydrogen can be thermodynamically "overunity" without violating Conservation of Energy principles, and without any nuclear reaction - due to the ubiquity of interfacial positronium (the Dirac epo field at the interface of 3-space) there is an old subject that keeps cropping up - the "water arc explosion." Mills' recent demo, a blatant knockoff of the Graneau ongoing work of twenty years, shows this route to gain.
The textbook energy from burning hydrogen in oxygen is 2.85 eV per molecule of H2O - which is both higher than can be achieved in practice and significantly higher than the energy required to split water catalytically. In short there is a large asymmetric energy gap which can be exploited in practice, and which is seen in a re-evaluation of the thermodynamics of Langmuir's torch, and which anomaly continues all the way to LENR, even when water is not used. Consider the combination of two molecules of H2 with one molecule of O2 to form two molecules of H2O. Energetically, the process requires very high initial energy to dissociate the H2 and O2, which is actually greater by far than the net yield. This required energy to dissociate the H2 and O2 is about eight times higher than required for splitting water. This is one basis for reports of "water fuel" and "Brown's gas" and HHO, going back to Dad Garrett in the Thirties http://www.mail-archive.com/vortex-l%40eskimo.com/msg14027.html Just to be clear, one can state with certainty that burning hydrogen only returns ~one third more energy than is expended to split the gases - so if the gases are made monatomic, then the net gain for the reaction is in the range of COP >2.4 over combustion - and that is chemical gain. This can be illustrated schematically but if the image does not appear, the URL is: http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/molecule/imgmol/beng2.gif We should also appreciate that 1.23 volts is the threshold required to split a proton from water using an electrolyte, but it is electrical potential - not mass energy, whereas 2.85 eV as a calculated chemical gain is mass-energy. And it is based on the assumption that it requires 9.7 eV net to dissociate the gases - which is far from true with a spillover catalyst like nickel. Anyway, one can calculate eV from volts by multiplying elementary charge (coulombs); since the energy (eV) is equal to the voltage V times the electric charge, the value of both is the same per atom when there is no recombination. Thus, the standard way of accounting for energy balance in hydrogen redox chemistry may not seem to "hold water" especially in circumstances where there is spillover-type catalysis, or plasma, and where most of the heat of a (predecessor) reaction is retained in a sequence, without recombination. The only thing holding us back is the notion of conservation of energy. That is where positronium enters the picture. We are not talking about antimatter annihilation - only capturing the binding energy of 6.8 eV of positronium or part of it - which can be done when any proton is split-off and "made nascent" near the threshold requirement of 1.23 volts per unit of charge in an electron-starved environment. In this case, the electron from Ps is available instead of the free electron from 3-space. A bare proton at Angstrom geometry is as close to one dimensional as possible - and exists at the interface of 3-space with reciprocal space (Dirac's term) until it grabs the electron from somewhere - such as from Ps, leaving the positron in reciprocal space. A UV photon comes along with the electron and there is evidence that two photons of 3.4 eV are shed in this reaction and one of them follows the electron. The coupling is electrostatic by proximity at the interface of 3-space to another dimension. "Virtual" positronium is "real" positronium at the one-dimensional interface for an instant. In fact, this time limit is critical, and seems to limit the ratio of gain (when figured this way) to something less than 3.4/1.23 = 2.76 which is the maximum COP available per pass. The problem of achieving net gain (in excess of chemical but less than nuclear) is twofold. First challenge is simply to remove heat to prevent a runaway, but not remove too much heat, so that the residual, which provides the energy required for continuity, is not compromised. The second is to avoid recombination losses. This is what Rossi appears to have accomplished catalytically with the E-Cat. Yet, it is arguable that with gain > 1, it should be possible to avoid any power input at all - which results in infinite COP. That is partly true, but if there is an absolute need for a threshold of thermal momentum - from continuously applied heat, added heat must be provided if it cannot be retained. The added heat is to provide the kind of solid floor for phonon coherence which is never possible with insulation alone. Since runaway is possible, one cannot solve the problem by supplying a large temperature cushion above the threshold. It is a razor edge and both negative feedback and positive feedback are juxtaposed. That is the basis for the non-nuclear argument, and its main claim to fame is extending the insight of Dirac, the greatest mind of the modern era. You may not agree with this explanation, especially in the case of Rossi's E-Cat, since his own nuclear explanation is vastly different - but this one is falsifiable and his explanation is already invalidated. The UV photon flux at 3.4 eV (365 nm) should be the key - and if a strong peak at this value turns up in the Rossi device - then it furthers the case that interfacial positronium is responsible for a part, or all of the net gain. There are those who would call this a Zero Point explanation, instead of a Dirac explanation, and there is no problem with that characterization either. In both cases we must invoke a field which is not in 3-space. That is the main obstacle since outside of cosmology, an extra dimension(s) is not an easy sell. Jones
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