(Swedish version here).
(UPDATED: A comment from Defkalion was added at 11:55. A comment from Prof Christos Stremmenos was added on Aug 9).
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In a press release Andrea Rossi states that the agreement between Praxen, the company that controls Defkalion, and EFA srl with Rossi’s wife Maddalena Pascucci as principal owner, is terminated.
As a consequence neither Praxen nor Defkalion holds any rights for exploitation of Andrea Rossi’s technology, it says in the release.
The technology is the so-called energy catalyzer that seems to generate heat from a previously unknown type of nuclear reaction.
No reason as to why the agreement is terminated is given.
“Since we will file a lawsuit to be tried in court, I cannot comment”, Rossi told Ny Teknik.
However, on his blog, Journal of Nuclear Physics, he states that “the issue is just financial, not personal, nor technological, nor scientific”.
Rossi said that the launch of a one megawatt heat plant, based on his technology, will take place as scheduled in October. The plant was supposed to be delivered to Defkalion and put in operation in Greece in October.
“The launch will take place in the United States under an agreement that we signed last week with one of the most important entities of the USA. It will be overseen by researchers at a very high level, but I cannot mention any names until after the launch”, Andrea Rossi said.
The press release noted that no information or industrial secrets have been transferred to Praxen-Defkalion.
Despite Rossi's statement Defkalion has no intention to stop the project.
"We believe we have a project. We continue the project. We still have a lot of trust in Mr Rossi. We believe in the technology. But as you understand we are receiving a lot of pressure, also Rossi is receiving a lot of pressure internationally. And we believe that Rossi is more vulnerable than us to pressure. This will be fixed I believe", Alexandros Xanthoulis, representing the investors told Ny Teknik.
(A complete statement from Defkalion can be found here).
(A comment from Prof. Christos Stremmenos, board member of Defkalion and the link between Bologna and Greece, can be found here).
After Defkalion'spress conference in Athens on 23 June, commercial interest in partnership with the company was significant. After a couple weeks, 850 companies from 63 countries contacted Defkalion and expressed interest in cooperation.
These companies received a message from Defkalion stating that the license fee for manufacturing Defkalion’s products in a country amounted to EUR 40.5 million, per plant. This included training and help to establish the factory.
According to Alexandros Xanthoulis, over 200 companies in 47 countries are now prepared to pay the license fee, out of which 17 companies have signed an agreement with Defkalion. No financial transactions has still been made though.
Alexandros Xanthoulis also confirmed that Defkalion hasn't yet paid any money to Rossi or to his companies.
In late July the debate on whether the E-cat is actually producing energy got new momentum when the online magazine Newenergytimes.com, specializing in LENR (Low Energy Nuclear Reactions), published a report on Rossi’s technology.
The report disputes the measurements made, and also observations made by Ny Teknik during two tests in April 2011.
According to the report the uncertainty regards whether all the water fed into the E-cat at the tests was actually evaporated, or if there was a large amount of water droplets dispersed in the steam. The hypothesis is that much less energy than calculated was required if the water was not completely evaporated.
Rossi relies on a report by the chemist Dr. Gilberto Galantini who measured the steam quality and stated that it contained at most 4.73 percent water by mass, which would affect the calculated energy by 2 percent.
Ny Teknik turned to Professor Björn Palm, Head of the Energy Technology Division at the Royal Institute of Technology, doing research on heat transfer by evaporation. Based on the given dimensions and geometry, he gave his assessment of the situation:
“Any air in the tube is driven out of the flowing steam. This means that at the outlet there is pure steam, possibly with a little water droplets that come with the flow from the liquid surface. However, I cannot imagine that this would affect the 'effective' enthalpy of vaporization. From other cases with evaporation in tubes I would guess that the steam quality is at least 90%. “
Working with his report, the journalist at Newenergytimes.com, Steven Krivit, asked assistance from Ny Teknik with interpretation of the measurements made so far.
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READ MORE: Our complete coverage on Rossi's E-cat can be found here.
