Fusion power is considered to be the holy grail of scientists working with energy in the future. Not only would fusion allow for nations to power their infrastructures without problem, it would also provide power to those seeking to leave the Earth’s orbit and travel to other worlds. And yet for years the secrets to fusion have remained beyond the capabilities of scientists to discover. For every breakthrough in the past that promised a future of free energy there always seemed to be still more setbacks. But two major contenders for fusion breakthroughs say research is moving closer to fusion energy than ever before.
The first, a name that most have heard by now is the Rossi Focardi E-Cat Energy catalyzer. Scientists Andrea Rossi and Sergio Focardi are credited with discovering a method by which cold fusion could be possible by adding nickel to a concoction that then creates heat with a small initial energy input and then emits a small amount of copper afterward.
The fusion experiment has been monitored by several scientists who suggest the pair may have come up with a serious cold fusion free energy device. And yet still more aren’t so certain this is real – and the fact that they won’t let anyone “look behind the curtain” and see how the device really works is troubling to skeptics concerned that there may be a ground line leading into the device either by faulty wiring or a purposeful sham. Additionally, the device sounds too much like magic for skeptics who say they need to know the principle behind the device before they’ll be able to verify it. Still, the possibility of cold fusion and the fact that so many reputable scientists have declared it genuine leaves the cold fusion debate very heated indeed.
The other contender for future fusion development comes from a New Jersey laboratory where scientists say they are two-thirds of the way toward unlocking a plasma based fusion capable of creating power and replacing politically contentious and potentially dangerous nuclear fission plants. The researchers at Lawrenceville Plasma Physics are freely sharing the results of their own experiments and hoping to finally open the door to a future of free energy in the coming decade. While the method of energy production will still take some time to develop, hopes are high at the Middlesex lab.
There’s no doubt that the future of energy will be one of the biggest issues facing scientists in the next ten or twenty years – and possibly longer than that. With resources declining worldwide, political pressure is on governments to find an alternative means of producing clean high energy output methods of power generation that will stand up to the economic costs during a global recession. While nuclear power has been proposed to ease the load off oil until a safer and cleaner method can be discovered, tragedy at Fukushima in March of last year reminded the world just how much could go wrong when it came to nuclear fission.
On the other hand, a free energy source would allow civilizations around the globe to have unparalleled influence over their environment, providing for the production and transportation of food, and even help any emerging aspirations toward colonizing other worlds.