New Energy Times has learned that Andrea Rossi’s one-megawatt “Energy Catalyzer” never shipped to his unidentified customer. The reason: leaky gaskets.
A Jan. 12, 2012, promotional video on Rossi’s Web site, Ecat.com, shows the same 1MW E-Cat sitting in the same place where it was “tested” by “the customer” three and half months ago.
Screenshot from Jan. 12, 2012 Rossi E-Cat Promotional Video
The dramatic image above is from a second camera team which is filming the first camera team which is interviewing Rossi. The 1MW plant appears to be idle while two E-Cats in the foreground are producing a gentle flow of steam.
According to comments Rossi made on his blog on June 18, 2011, he had 300 working reactors in his Miami factory. He did not report any gasket problem at the time.
“We have 300 reactors in operation now in our factory,” Rossi wrote, “and we are making exponential progress day by day.
“My 300 reactors actually under stress tests are making steam without water, I mean perfectly dry steam, and they will go in operation not in my factory, but in the factory of our Customer.”
For readers who missed our “Report 3” seven months ago, perfectly dry steam is invisible.
Journalist Mats Lewan reported on Oct. 29, 2011 about the much-anticipated Oct. 28, 2011 test.
“According to the report,” Lewan wrote, “the test was approved and the plant would now be transported to the customer.”
However, the report does not say it would be transported anywhere, and it wasn’t.
“The results of the test are satisfactory to accept the delivery,” the report states.
Below the conclusion, there is a handwritten note by the person Rossi identified as the customer’s representative, Domenico Fioravanti.
“To be upgraded the system of gaskets some leaks have been noticed,” Fioravanti wrote.
Most of the report was drafted and typed in advance of the test — including the conclusion.
Conclusion of Oct. 28, 2011 1MW inauguration and test by Rossi customer
The poorly redacted lines for the affiliations were decoded by clever readers months ago.
In the place where Rossi’s company is named, it says “For Leonardo Corporation.”
In the place where the customer is named, it says, “For the Customer.”
Steven, since you have gotten this far, why not dspend $100 bucks and hire a proate investigator in Rome to do do a thorough name search for Col. Fioravanti and find out definitively who he was associated with? That’s not as expensive as it sounds.
Hello Joe,
For what purpose please?
SBK
At the outset, I want to make clear that this comment should not be taken as a defense of Rossi. In this post, you stated “perfectly dry steam is invisible.” While this statement is not in dispute, I’m not sure if it is reasonable to expect dry steam to exist in the general environment depicted in the video. The dryness/wetness and therefore the visibility of the steam is dependent on the temperature and pressure of the environment. Playing devils advocate, is it possible that the steam was dry at the time and location of its creation inside the device, but upon exiting to a cooler and lower pressure environment, the dry steam immediate condensed into visible wet steam? I am in no way an expert, so feel free to point out my misunderstanding if warranted.
Hi Jeff,
You’re right, of course. Dry steam becomes wet steam I did not want to turn the article into a 200-page technical report. We did that, 7 months ago, thanks to the contributions from many experts. Exit velocity also determines when dry steam drops in temperature and begins condensing.
I appreciate you bringing this point up.
SBK
It can be maddeningly difficult to reign in scams like these. I give you kudos for doing what you can. FWIW, I have been there/done that in the arena of internet scams myself. In the case I was involved (PRSI Inc) it was something I knew a fair amount about and could judge the claims made by the company as pie-in-the-sky. Turned out the scam I was speaking out against (and was prosecuted by the Attorney General of Florida) was run at by the mob!! At the time it was being hailed as the largest internet scam ever (I think 16 million$). I was VERY outspoken on the web, going so far as to call the Attorney General in FL that I was about to write a huge expose. The AG office begged me to keep it under wraps for a few days because it turned out they were (coincidentally) just about to do a takedown. During the whole process, I engaged with countless company shills. The pattern with PRSI was exactly the same as with these [Rossi/Dek]scammers. Promises, promises, promises. Technical delay, technical delay, technical delay. Unending conference calls to the faithful. etc. ad nauseum. At some point (like now with Rossi/Dek) you have to put up or shut up. You raise enough expectations that the eyes of not just the fascinated and confused are focused on you, but also the powers that be (legally).
At this point in the game, there are many curious players, angles, etc. Some posit that you should chase them down. I actually did chase down the guy who turned on PRSI (inside corporate officer) and talked with him on the phone a couple times. I think the guy was a corporate crook of longstanding nature and turned state’s evidence as payoff for them not prosecuting him (Richard Snell if memory serves me). There’s sufficient internet trail on PRSI if anybody is curious. Unfortunately, I cannot find an online link for the Florida newspaper that quoted me (one of their reporters called me) when PRSI was eventually busted.
So the question I wonder about isn’t whether this tech is real/works. It doesn’t. The question to me is whether the people in the countries that Rossi has chosen to do business in will be able to legally pursue him when this whole thing comes crashing down, or whether he has sufficiently insulated himself by virtue of legal contract/etc. At the end of the day I sorely hope this whole thing doesn’t come down to a reliance on Greek banking law….
Enjoy.
And one other thing. I have absolutely no expertise in the science of cold fusion/lenr. My opinions on the worthlessness of these claims comes as a result of being accustomed to the pattern recognition of scammers and reading lay-based articles from other experts. I only picked up an interest in this LENR subject around Nov 2011 iirc. When I returned my attention to the subject earlier this year, it was obvious that the gig was up for [Rossi]. The Aussie Skeptic’s Society and Dick Smith pretty much drove the final nail in the coffin.
For the E-cat lovers and Rossi supporters: As much as you wish it to be true, this isn’t religion, it’s science. No amount of Believium will change that fact.
Enjoy.
thetimchannel
I read your comments with great interest. I am one of the ‘believers’ who is becoming slowly aware that my desire to want to believe is clouding my impartiality.
What I am starting to see, is that the people claiming to have high energy yield LENR output just can’t seem to satisfy all the experts and thus in the world of LENR the only people currently defending the eCat & Hyperion devices are those who have succumbed to the religion of unlimited LENR & that the 2nd coming is nigh.
The breakthrough for me was the nagging doubt as to how Defkalion produced their miracle baby – the hyperion – nothing more & nothing less – when they claimed they had a LENR device that exceeded even Rossi’s claims. It is surely the single greatest miracle of 2011.
Defkalion started out in Jan 2011 on the premise they would take eCats from Rossi & add value, initially a home heating add-on. Then some major bust up occured in mid 2011 & a few weeks later the miracle arrived. Out of nowhere came the hyperion.
Meanwhile labs and other researchers all over the world and with 20+ years of trial and error, still can only produce very low powered examples of LENR. Recently at MIT we saw SRI scientists demoing a very small unit with a COP of 10+ but very little real power even if the gains were impressive.
For months I have passed off Rossi’s eccentric behavior as why he might actually be genuine, but am starting to wonder if Rossi’s belief in his eCat as a commercial product is self-delusion or just a flat case of he can’t deliver on his claims. There has to be an answer to why Defkalion & Rossi had such a big falling out. It is starting to look like Defkalion opted to play Rossi’s game & thus their miracle baby was born. They have started talking about 7 so called sets of tests by ‘independent’ testers chosen by them
then we heard of their plans to ask for 40mill Euro dollar in fees for a right to manufacture hyperions in each country / location they designate.
One might ask if anyone would be stupid enough to pay over that kind of money for a device of which no one has *ever* *anywhere* in the world, seen a commercial ready unit. We hereere lots os promises that it will one day be here. Real soon now I think is the phrase that encapsulates this belief.
So as of today my alarm bells are ringing louder & louder as to the scope and scale of the deception and that indeed we may well be looking at a monumental scam where so many of us just don’t want to see the obvious because we are so committed to believing it is real and that dear grandad Rossi or corporate Defkalion would never ever ever think of doing such a thing (I mean to say, isn’t Greece a scion of stability & fiscal responsibility).
The straw that broke the camel’s back for me was when I asked Andrea Rossi if he believed that Defkalion had ‘borrowed’ his invention & if he did, had he contemplated legal action against them should they try to sell one. Or, was his way of dealing with the matter to simply under price & outsell them ?. Andrea responded with his now infamous “WANNABEE COMPETITORS” post.
http://www.journal-of-nuclear-physics.com/?p=580&cpage=3#comment-185350
No hint of him saying they stole his invention. In fact he states he doesn’t see any serious competitor and doen’t even see one on the horizon. That could be because he knows it doesn’t work – what Rossi as alerted me to is that they Defkalion) stole his scam. !!!
Doug M (dsm)
Hi Doug,
Very interesting thoughts. As far as relationship, I have a quote somewhere in my files that Pascucci stated on record that the E-Cat had to pass a performance test before DGT would make their first progress payment. I think we all know that, out of Rossi’s own mouth, DFK didn’t make it’s first progress payment.
As to the observation in your last paragraph, “what Rossi as alerted me to is that they Defkalion) stole his scam.!!” – that is exactly what it looks like to me – though I admit partial ignorance because I have not been following DGT in any detail. I just see and hear the reflections back. People seem to think that DGT is “more credible” than Rossi and that they’re not making the same “public relations mistakes” as Rossi.
As I mentioned in another post, I am working on a timeline, fully reference to source material of the Rossi story. When I put it up, you and others will be able to see a lot more. I will be looking forward to hearing more of your insights then.
SBK
My initial notice/interest in this was late in the game and more of a drive-by. I noted the dates of the early promises and came back later to check on them. That’s when I noticed a pattern of deception similar to other scams (not necessarily free energy). The Defkalion angle is one that I overlook for the most part. The fact there was ever an interaction with Defkalion/Rossi taints Defkalion IMHO. I know nothing about the Defkalion Corp outside of the internal references here. They could be as much a fantasy as the E-cat (the corp not just the product). I don’t know or care. It might interest me if Proctor and Gamble, Johnson Controls, or any of a bevy of other corporations I know actually exist were making the claim, but not some company I never heard of. If I were the CEO of Defkalion and I had figured Rossi was trying to scam me, I might just send him down the road and continue to taunt him with false info on my competitive intentions as a way to force him to submit to proper testing (and thereby by humiliated). Or perhaps Defkalion is simply copy cloning Rossi scam? We can be sure they’re not copy cloning any actual technology.
I am not astounded by all the ‘inside baseball and degree of minutial detail many of you show on this subject. When I was hip deep in the crap of the PRSI scam, I could name drop all the key players and connections. That particular high tech scam also used an ‘affinity’ connection angle (UL, NI, University..). In the case of PRSI, they simply set up a sister company (name escapes me*) and played off against it for delays, excuses, etc….CITX* CITX was suppose to deliver the technology solution that PRSI had already sold to their members. LOL. Is Defkalion to Rossi what CITX once was to PRSI? But the point of all this is not technological, it is legal. At the end of the day, PRSI/CITX got shuttered and people went to jail because it was all happening in the US (out of Floriduh). The degree of technological ineptitude shown by the PRSI guys who were scamming on the basis of having the highest tech of the time is curiously familiar with that of Rossi. The only excuse I don’t think I ever heard PRSI say about tech ‘delays’ at CITX was that the servers had leaky gaskets. I think that’s only because nobody at the company thought of it.
I wonder that even though we all can see this is going to end as a major fiasco for Rossi, if at the end of the day, he’s going to face any legal consequences (as well as others if my suspicions are correct) for his efforts? But for the Attorney General of the State of Florida deciding to personally take on THE MOB, PRSI might have rolled along for quite awhile longer. If you think I’m being a bit hyperbolic on the ‘mob’ angle with PRSI, you ought to look at the names of the list of defendants charged in the case. http://www.prsiinc.com/
and http://www.prsiinc.com/Press%20Releases/News%20Release.html
On Monday, Caudell said that PRSI started with honorable intentions.
“Even though we started as a viable project, there was a time I turned it loose to people I had no control over,” Caudell said.
Those individuals were led by Joseph “Joey Flowers” Rotunno, who has been identified by federal prosecutors as the head of New York’s Colombo crime family’s South Florida crew. Rotunno, serving a 6 1/2-year sentence on racketeering charges, and his partners contributed $40,000 to PRSI in May 1999 and took control of the company’s finances, according to defense attorney Stephen Golembe.
I guess I am in the minority here in still believing that Rossi and Defkalion have exactly what they claim to have mainly because I don’t see where they stand to make any money.. If Rossi follows through and creates the $800 home e-cat, hel’ll only sell a few before the scam is revealed. Both Rossi and Defkalion could get a multi-million dollar score through licensing or the 1MW unit in Ross’s case. I can’t believe that anyone would shell out thousands or millions for something that doesn’t work and hasn’t be fully tested prior to payment. I would agree that these extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof. To SK and others here – that means a unit given to MIT for independent testing. For others that might mean an $800 device that was purchased at Home Depot and heats their homes for $30 a year. Another thing that puts me in the believium camp is the Zawodney patent for a device that sounds pretty much like the gizmo that Rossi claims to have. Another plus in Rossi’s favor is what appears to be full support of Focardi. It’s well known that Rossi has a bit of a checkered past but the same can not be said of Focardi. I don’t believe he would lend his name to a scam and don’t believe he could be tricked with a scam device. So far Rossi has apparently met the timetable he has laid out. The proof will come with results of Defkalion testing or by a device that works. We will see soon enough..
Hi Mark,
Thanks for your thoughts, I’m sure that you are not alone and that many other people share your perspective as well. So I’ll remind you at first of a few things.
I quoted Tony Tether in Report #3
http://newenergytimes.com/v2/news/2011/37/3701editorial.shtml “If it is a hoax, it is a damn good one.” Therefore, if you eventually conclude that it is a hoax, don’t feel so bad.
Second, in Report #3, we did not merely show how Rossi’s device could be a hoax. We showed that Rossi himself provided direct evidence that it was wrong. You will notice that on all the Rossi fan sites, including the Rossi-commissioned “news site” PESN, that they fail to consider this fact. I don’t think Rossi has ever explained, precisely, with calculations, why his puffs of steam, along with condensation as expected, could explain the discrepancy of what should have looked like a jet stream.
Instead, you will see an enormous amount of public dialouge on the Internet for and by Rossi about nearly every other aspect of E-Cat. The important facts become lost in all of this noise – by design.
Motive/Money: At this point in time, I am not sure what to believe about the early relationship between Rossi and Ampenergo and DGT. But remember these and take them at face value:
- May 16, 2011: Craig Cassarino of Ampenergo says it has made payment to Rossi. Lewan: “Have you paid anything to Rossi yet? Cassarino: “Yes we have.” Lewan: “How much?” Cassarino: “Let’s put it like this, it was an important piece of the equation.”
- June 10, 2011: Lewan quotes Maddalena Pascucci: “The contract [with Defkalion] can be defined by two basic steps. The first is an experimental test. If the test goes well, there will be an initial down payment.”
Then add to the picture these facts:
- July 22, 2011: Rossi said, according to Nelson. “If anybody wants to test my device, I want to be paid. If people want to test it, they can buy it for $15 million.”
- Aug. 2-4, 2011: Rossi meets with investor John Preston of Quantum Energy Technologies in Boston, Mass. Asks Preston for either $15 million or $150 million (Different numbers from different sources).
Does this help to answer your question about where Rossi stands to make money? But this is only part of the picture. There is another part too, and we are working on that story.
Now you wonder, why does Rossi bother with all this talk about home units, and taking pre-orders from private individuals for their homes. And for that matter, why he bothers talking to reporters and inviting them to come check out his device (as he once did with me.)
The answer: We are part of his PR machine. We are not the marks. We are, or have been, part of the spectacle (the Big Con) designed to attract the marks.
And it doesn’t matter to Rossi if he can’t deliver what he promises. His track record with TE/Army and Petroldragon proves this.
http://newenergytimes.com/v2/sr/RossiECat/docs/2004Army-ApplicationOfThermoelectricDevices.pdf
http://newenergytimes.com/v2/sr/RossiECat/RaiNews-TV-TheMagicofMrRossi.shtml
Why is it that the only evidence of spectacular TE results happened once at one University and were never replicated? What do we really know about that study? More importantly, what did the Army know about that University of New Hampshire study before it agreed to award Rossi the grant to do further TE development?
As far as the Zawodny/NASA patent application: You’ve very confused, where are you getting your information from? The Zawodny/NASA patent has nothing to do with Rossi except for the fact that Rossi has tried, poorly, to co-opt some of the same underlying scientific research that has been devloped by Widom and Larsen, and by Piantelli.
As far as Focardi, you think it is inconceivable that he would lend his name to a scam and that it is inconceivable he could be tricked with a scam device. Ditto for the three Swedish professors. Permit me to quote from the movie classic “The Princess Bride.”
Vizzini: HE DIDN’T FALL? INCONCEIVABLE!
Inigo Montoya: “You keep using that word. I do not think that word means what you think it means.”
SBK
The Zawodny patent relates to Rossi only in that it seems to describe a similar device and includes a possible theoretical framework for its operation. That makes the Rossi device possible. The claims from Defkalion that they will have numerous people testing their device (possibly within days) makes it less likely(to me) that there is trickery going on. To me, a scam like this would quietly yield a couple million dollars from a small number of gullible investors – not the big public show that is going on all over the Interwebs. The stuff you’ve raised recently about the 1MW plant not shipping and the denial from National Instruments is very damning. Those things along with your steam measurement analysis taken by themselves seem very conclusive of fraud. I still however think Rossi and Defkalion have something based on the totality of what Rossi says, what Defkalion says, the Zawodny patent application and other circumstantial evidence. My belief is not going to cost me any money because I would need concrete proof before parting with my money. If you don’t mind me saying so – you seem to have fixated on being a Rossi debunker and might not be giving the Defkalion claims, Zawodny patent their due consideration as circumstantial evidence. We can all agree that Piantelli, Levi, Focardi, and others have documented excess heat using the principles that Rossi claims to be using. What is debatable is whether or not Rossi, Defkalion, and maybe others have found the secret sauce to create something commercially viable. Until they prove it – either with a commercial device that works – or with plausible scientific validation … I see no harm in looking at the body of evidence – however circumstantial – and being hopeful that this very needed technology is real. The truth will come out in relatively short order. I can’t prove the devices work, and you can’t prove they don’t. We can each take our relative doses of Believium – or Non-Believium and wait until things shake out. I will say that the work you are doing is a welcome part of the shake out. It will bring pressure to bear on people with wild claims to cough up some equally wild proof.
Hi Mark,
Again, thanks for your thoughts and more importantly, thanks for your professional and courteous debate. Here’s what I ask you: If you learn that any person you consider to be credible has tested any Rossi/DGT device, and has determined a positive result either by their own tests, or by publicly available plausible scientific validation, please let me know. Actually, I’d like to ask the inverse from you as well. Please define “relatively short order.” Pick a date. If AR/DGT have not provided you with credible and convincing evidence by then, I would like you to get back to me and our readers. You will be doing us all a tremendous favor.
You wrote that I seem to be “fixated on being a Rossi debunker and might not be giving the Defkalion claims, Zawodny patent their due consideration as circumstantial evidence.”
Your word ” fixated” is a bit pejorative but I don’t think you meant to insult. Perhaps you mean “convinced.” Am I convinced that Rossi’s claims are bunk? Absolutely. Am I interested in reporting my conclusion? Absolutely. Why? Nelson said it better than me:
“LENR is another [energy] avenue. It’s not just about Rossi,” Nelson said, “If the Rossi thing doesn’t happen, then maybe something else will. Hope is good as long as it’s not false hope. False hope is one of the most destructive kinds of forces in the LENR field. The sooner it is weeded out, the better for all.”
I am not paying any attention to DGT, this is true. I have spent the last ten years reporting on science and scientific claims. If DGT has science, I will pay attention. If they have a technology they can deliver, I will pay attention. I will not pay attention, however, to their words. If and when DGT has something that anybody can buy, then we have something to talk about.
OTOH, if they really have something to sell now, then they need no endorsement, no visiting experts, no quasi-public tests. All they need is a Web site to display the product and purchase details and a checking account in which to deposit the money. Done.
You wrote: “Piantelli, Levi, Focardi, and others have documented excess heat using the principles that Rossi claims to be using.” The only part about this is true is the work of Piantelli, which he did with Focardi.
Hope is good. Hope for LENR is really good. And well-placed. If you end up buying a Rossi/DGT device, one that does not require an external genset to power it, then it will be a good day for us all.
If that day never arrives, and you end up deciding that Rossi was running a con, please don’t forget that I tried my best to help you differentiate between the legitimate scientific efforts of people in the LENR field and Rossi/DGT.
SBK
Re: dates
It’s looking like DGT may accept the Smith $1M challenge. If they proceed with that or the testing of “seven well know labs” that they are promising – I would expect multiple reports that concur with their claims within 6-9 months. This will probably still not be the sort of independent offisite testing that is required for absolute proof. I will take Rossi at his word and declare it a scam if he doesn’t produce a device by June of 2013. Furthermore, if this technology is for real, I would expect that somebody would achieve convincing results with the same Edisonian methods that Rossi apparently used – also within the same period. So – I will start believing that this is some sort of hoax if DGT doesn’t come up with some plausible tests within 6 months, and declare it a hoax/debacle if we don’t have something by June 2013.
If it turns out that I’m wrong and it’s all a hoax, I’ll take all the I-told-ya-so’s I have coming.
Hi Mark,
You’re milestones are useful and generous.
I don’t see any value in “I-told-ya-so’s.” I see value in learning and understanding, especially about LENR. I see value in applying knowledge, time, money, energy anD attention effectively and constructively. If you understand something that I do not, I would like to learn from you. If I understand something that you don’t, it would satisfy me to help you learn. It would not bring me satisfaction to tell you that I told you so.
Do you recognize that the fundamental underlying science has the capability to provide what you expect from the devices promised by Andrea Rossi and Defkalion?
I would like to know if you believe in the fundamental LENR science as strongly as you believe in Andrea Rossi and Defkalion? (why or why not?)
SBK.
Based on my knowledge – I don’t think there is any doubt that LENR is a potentially viable technology. The exact physics are up for debate and the full potential is unknown. The slides you obtained from the FOIA from the 9/2012 NASA presentation really pushed me from hopeful/wishful to something more. There seems to have been enough experimental results to convince me that LENR is real and on the verge of a breakthrough. Now, I fancy myself an adherent of critical thinking – which may surprise you. There is no credible evidence that vaccines cause autism or that there are any health risks from genetically altered crops. Similarly there is no credible evidence that Rossi or DGT have the devices they claim to have. I choose to believe that they do based on circumstantial evidence. That support/belief however is not without bound. I’m not going to give anyone $800 for a device until I see some evidence that it works. Every day that goes by Rossi looks more and more dubious but I still do think he has something. Here is the difference between the vaccine nuts and me and my Rossi belief: No amount of proof will ever satisfy the vaccine people – they will always some fringe nutritionist to validate their belief that vaccines caused their kid’s autism. My belief in Rossi is dependent on either independent verification or a device in my cellar that works. My belief will not persist forever – it has a shelf life of around 18 months for Rossi/DGT.
Critical thinking is great. It is a very safe position to disbelieve without irrefutable evidence. It is also the proper position to take most of the time. Based on the sum of the information out there (experimental, Rossi, DGT, Zawodny, NASA, and the upcoming CERN symposium) – I’m willing to go out on a limb and say that I think the LENR breakthrough has happened and now we’re all just waiting for the proof that meets our individual standards. This planet needs the sort of energy that LENR can provide and I don’t care if it is delivered by Rossi, DGT, NASA, or K-Mart.
Hi Mark,
I appreciate your critical thinking and I’m sure many readers do as well.
SBK