Perpetual motion frauds are back!

[Jadeite]

Link

It sounds too good to be true - not to mention the fact that it violates almost every known law of physics.

But British scientists claim they have invented a revolutionary device that seems to 'create' energy from virtually nothing.

Their so-called thermal energy cell could soon be fitted into ordinary homes, halving domestic heating bills and making a major contribution towards cutting carbon emissions.

Even the makers of the device are at a loss to explain exactly how it works - but sceptical independent scientists carried out their own tests and discovered that the 12in x 2in tube really does produce far more heat energy than the electrical energy put in.

The device seems to break the fundamental physical law that energy cannot be created from nothing - but researchers believe it taps into a previously unrecognised source of energy, stored at a sub-atomic level within the hydrogen atoms in water.

The system - developed by scientists at a firm called Ecowatts in a nondescript laboratory on an industrial estate at Lancing, West Sussex - involves passing an electrical current through a mixture of water, potassium carbonate (otherwise known as potash) and a secret liquid catalyst, based on chrome.

This creates a reaction that releases an incredible amount of energy compared to that put in. If the reaction takes place in a unit surrounded by water, the liquid heats up, which could form the basis for a household heating system.

If the technology can be developed on a domestic scale, it means consumers will need much less energy for heating and hot water - creating smaller bills and fewer greenhouse gases.

Jim Lyons, of the University of York, independently evaluated the system. He said: 'Let's be honest, people are generally pretty sceptical about this kind of thing. Our team was happy to take on the evaluation, even if to prove it didn't work.

'But this is a very efficient replacement for the traditional immersion heater. We have examined this interesting technology and when we got the rig operating, we were getting 150 to 200 per cent more energy out than we put in, without trying too hard.

Repost from SomethingAwful. Dumbasses.

[Darth Wong]

Wow, chemical reactions + electricity = more output than electrical input. As if we didn't already know this.

[SirNitram]

Wow, chemical reactions + electricity = more output than electrical input. As if we didn't already know this.

More venture capital this way, no doubt.

[Surlethe]

At first blush, this doesn't sound like a perpetual motion machine any more than a car engine is a perpetual motion machine based on comparing electricity in vs. heat out. If it's true, then the extra energy is locked up in the chemical bonds of the "secret catalyst", potassium carbonate, and water. In fact (again assuming it's true), I'm willing to bet that the manufacture of the K2CO3 and the "secret catalyst" requires proportionally more energy than is released in the device.

[Starglider]

Unfortunately there's no 'are back' about it. Perpetual motion scams have been growing like a particularly foul breed of mushroom recently, with the loon end of the 'alternative energy' community (the large section that intersects with conspiracy theory in particular) cranking out a new 'SECRET ENERGY SOURCE THE GOVERNMENT DOESN'T WANT YOU TO KNOW ABOUT' on a daily basis. Ones plausible enough to suck in 'investment' money from idiots appear on at least a monthly basis. This just isn't going to go away (though huge amounts of cheap fusion or solar would mitigate it a bit); wishful thinking is wishful thinking, and the technobabble just updates to track current popsci buzzwords.

[Vendetta]

The only thing "perpetual" about these things is the number of people willing to claim that they've done it.

This is no different. If it's a reasonably efficient system in terms of the amount of energy required to create it against the amount it can release, it might be good as a medium for transporting energy in fuel cells, otherwise it'll just be another also ran.

[General Zod]

Even the makers of the device are at a loss to explain exactly how it works >snip<

Then how exactly do they expect to mass produce it?

[DPDarkPrimus]

Perpetual motion frauds are back!

They never went away.

[Admiral Valdemar]

Then how exactly do they expect to mass produce it?

They don't. They just want some gullible sod who failed high school science to pump millions into R&D that won't go anywhere, because that cash is going towards a few extra props and a whole lot of private bank accounts.

[Surlethe]

Even the makers of the device are at a loss to explain exactly how it works >snip<

Then how exactly do they expect to mass produce it?

I'm curious how, once they know what the "secret catalyst" is, they can't figure out where the energy's coming from. I mean, it shouldn't be much more than a high school chemistry problem, for god's sake.

[Azazal]

Even the makers of the device are at a loss to explain exactly how it works >snip<

Then how exactly do they expect to mass produce it?

I'm curious how, once they know what the "secret catalyst" is, they can't figure out where the energy's coming from. I mean, it shouldn't be much more than a high school chemistry problem, for god's sake.

For some reason I'm getting the feeling that the secrect catalst is a bunson burner

[kinnison]

This probably isn't relevant to this particular piece of impossible junk, but there is a way of apparently getting something for nothing - heat exchange systems, in which you essentially use a refrigerator circuit to get for your use more heat than you put in as high-grade energy. Of course, the apparently free heat is coming from something external; a river full of water, the outside air, something like that. I seem to remember that this way, you can get about triple the amount of useful low-grade heat that you put in as power. It's usually used as space heating; interestingly enough, the systems usually double as air conditioners when it's hot.

Has anyone seen any studies on the idea of using this sort of system to boost the efficiency of, for example, power stations, by heating up the input water? I confess that my thermodynamics is too rusty (I haven't actually used it for over twenty-five years) to find out whether this sort of thing is feasible.

[Howedar]

Well it's then basically a Sterling engine between a hot and cold reservoir, only with more parts and irreversibilities and tendency to break.

Why not just use your Sterling engine, then? Between, say, a hot day and the Earth a few thousand feet down.

[Darth Wong]

This probably isn't relevant to this particular piece of impossible junk, but there is a way of apparently getting something for nothing - heat exchange systems, in which you essentially use a refrigerator circuit to get for your use more heat than you put in as high-grade energy. Of course, the apparently free heat is coming from something external; a river full of water, the outside air, something like that. I seem to remember that this way, you can get about triple the amount of useful low-grade heat that you put in as power. It's usually used as space heating; interestingly enough, the systems usually double as air conditioners when it's hot.

Has anyone seen any studies on the idea of using this sort of system to boost the efficiency of, for example, power stations, by heating up the input water? I confess that my thermodynamics is too rusty (I haven't actually used it for over twenty-five years) to find out whether this sort of thing is feasible.

You're talking about a heat pump, which does not actually get "something for nothing", but merely moves a quantity of energy from one place to another.

And no, the idea is totally inapplicable to power stations, which recycle the same steam through the system. They do not continuously intake cold water, heat it up at the reactor to steam, and then use it to run turbines.

[kinnison]

Darth, of course you are not getting something for nothing - that's why I used the word "apparently" twice. What you are getting, however, is more heat where you want it than you have had to pay for; the Earth's atmosphere (or hydrosphere) pays the difference in terms of cooling of said atmosphere/hydrosphere.

On the subject of the cycle inside a power station; sure, it's closed-circuit - but the steam is (I believe) condensed and is certainly cooled down and reduced in pressure on its way through. I was referring to heating the water going into the boiler by cooling something else, thus reducing the needed heat input from fuel. I confess that I no longer have the skill to calculate whether you'd actually gain anything by doing this.

[Darth Wong]

On the subject of the cycle inside a power station; sure, it's closed-circuit - but the steam is (I believe) condensed and is certainly cooled down and reduced in pressure on its way through. I was referring to heating the water going into the boiler by cooling something else, thus reducing the needed heat input from fuel. I confess that I no longer have the skill to calculate whether you'd actually gain anything by doing this.

I don't think you understand the basic concept of what a power plant is. The objective is not to heat up the coolant; that is merely the means to an end. The objective is to extract heat from the fuel burning operation. If you pre-heated the coolant before it hit the boiler, you would actually make it less efficient at extracting energy from the burning operation. And the coolant cycle is at such high temperatures that your heat pump efficiency would drop into the toilet anyway.

[Adrian Laguna]

Basically efficiency is increased by widening the temperature difference. This can be done by cooling the water more, making the burner part hotter, or both. Kinnison your idea does the opposite and makes the temperature difference narrower, thus lowering efficiency.

[kinnison]

I stand corrected - told you I was rusty!

I've been looking into this. Maximum theoretical efficiency is some function of the temperature difference between heat source (burning fuel, maybe 1500 deg C or 1850K) and cooling water - maybe 15 deg C or 290K. There appear to be two heat transfers - fuel to working fluid and working fluid to cooling water - apart from losses to the environment of course.

Of course, this means that the temperature of the exhaust from the burners needs to be as close as possible to the temperature of the process steam leaving the boiler - which may leave some room for some efficiency savings from using flue gases to preheat the input water. I confess to not knowing whether this is normal practise, or what the normal temperature of the flue gases usually is compared to the temp of the process steam.

Probably, much larger savings in total energy efficiency can be made by using the low-grade (50 deg C?) output heat for something - maybe space heating or heating greenhouses. District heat and power, in other words. After all, in winter at any rate, you have to get your space heating energy from somewhere - it may as well be lowgrade heat not useful for anything else. That way, efficiency of use of the original energy source is much higher.

[Darth Wong]

Oh for fuck's sake, the flue gases are cooler than the steam is. They would cool it down, not heat it. Once you've heated up the steam you want to get it to the turbines ASAP. All the output of the power plant comes from steam pressure, and the steam cycle keeps it hot enough to avoid condensation.

[kinnison]

Oh for fuck's sake, the flue gases are cooler than the steam is. They would cool it down, not heat it. Once you've heated up the steam you want to get it to the turbines ASAP. All the output of the power plant comes from steam pressure, and the steam cycle keeps it hot enough to avoid condensation.

The flue gases are cooler than the steam? I rather doubt it. What I refer to is the flue gases immediately next to the combustion chamber, which will be hotter than the steam in the boiler - they have to be for the reason you have stated. Of course they cool down rather rapidly as they go up the chimney; that's not exactly the point, is it?

In any case, there has to be a certain amount of leakage in the system, hence a certain amount of water going into the boilers - perhaps not much. Are you telling me that the steam is kept as steam throughout and not condensed? Because if so there would appear to be room for another cycle where it is condensed. And what's with the cooling water - the waste heat that it's taking up has to come from somewhere, right?

In any case, the second point remains. Whatever the details of the heat cycle within the turbine system, cool water (cooling water, not the steam in the turbine system) goes in and hot water (perhaps hot-bath hot, perhaps central heating radiator hot) comes out. That low-grade heat has to be good for something. In fact I know it is, because there are entire towns in Scandinavia heated by that means. In one I've heard of, there are also uses found for the calcium sulphate coming out of the flue gas scrubbers - it goes to a plasterboard factory. And for the furnace ash, which is used to make some other sort of building material; I forget what.

[Winston Blake]

Mixed with water [potassium carbonate] causes an exothermic reaction that results in a temperature change, producing heat.

[Junghalli]

Even the makers of the device are at a loss to explain exactly how it works >snip<

Then how exactly do they expect to mass produce it?

Presumably the same way Renaissance Europeans produced gunpowder, and cave men made fire. Rote duplication. They didn't know shit about the physics or chemistry of it, they just knew that if you prepared the right mixture in a certain way you'd get something that went boom really nicely, or that if you rubbed two pieces of wood together the right way you'd get a flame.

Actually understanding how something works isn't as vital as one might at first think. The critical factor is being able to duplicate the effect reliably: as long as you can do that you have a useable technology, even if you have no clue why it actually works.

This is all speaking hypothetically, of course.