Whatever happened to cold fusion?

Question

As we all know, fusion power always seems 20 years off from anything workable (let alone "breaking even"). However, at least twice (were there more?) folks have claimed to find a way of fusing H atoms in some sort of dense matrix. I assume the Utah Institute never worked out. What about using the extreme heat of bubble formation and collapse in cavitation? Was it in acetone or some such organic liquid? Curious how this all came out. Anyone know?

Found the link on bubble-collapse fusion. I guess it is real...but hardly an energy producer.
http://www.purdue.edu/UNS/html4ever/2005/050712.Xu.fusion.html

Answer 1

It joined a long list of irreproducible results. If someone else can't reproduce a reported effect, either the reporter was mistaken, or is lying, or didn't observe everything that was going on. Science is the way we tell the truth from the lies.... until someone can reliably reproduce the results, there's no point in speculating anything about them. Lots of smart people have tried, but evidently something is missing in the equation.

Answer 2

Cold fusion sent the stock market into meltdown, so the oil magnates bought the patents and buried them at the bottom of a dried up well, right on top of the inventors.

Answer 3

It didn't work. Doesn't stop someone from reinventing it every few months and calling the local news, but it doesn't work. Check out Robert Park's book "Voodoo Science" for a full explanation - he's the head of the American Physical Society.

Answer 4

Actually fusion has been 40 years off since the 50s, and still is 40 years off. ;-)
Cold fusion was a fraud. No one was able to duplicate what was reportedly done. ~

Answer 5

As you can imagine, it was proved that it didn't produce more energy then it consumed. Don't look for it at your local hardware store any time soon (or forever for that matter).