Brillouin Energy Corp [website] is one of the handful of labs focused on engineering a thermal generator and they have just re-designed their signature Hot Tube. Francis Tanzella, electrochemist at Energy Research Center, LLC, gave an update on his most recent work with Brillouin at the ICCF25 conference. Watch the presentation here.
The talk is primarily about the calorimetry as the lab begins to test system re-design.
Fran Tanzella has examined Brillouin systems for ten years now, maintaining an independence by taking contracts from third-parties. However, decades before Brillouin, he had been evaluating client contract systems at SRI International [website].
SRI, International
It was in 1992 that the Electric Power Research Institute, a non-profit energy research, development, and deployment organization, gave a contract to SRI International for research on Cold Fusion. SRI electrochemist and lab Director Michael McKubre formed the Energy Research Center (ERC) as a stand alone unit that worked exclusively on that contract. The Energy Research Center became a fully-equipped lab and Tanzella was there with McKubre, performing historic experiments connecting heat, helium, as well as contracting for various clients verifying results. Twenty-years later, Fran and Mike were the core team contracted with validating the prototype technology of Brillouin Energy Corp., designed by Chief Technical Officer Robert Godes.
Tanzella recalls, “The Brillouin contract was executed sometime later and we oversaw their calorimetry measurements. We later helped them redesign their heat flow calorimeter. Using System Identification we used a dynamic (instantaneous) calorimetry method. After writing annual reports describing their work, I became the person presenting their calorimetry results at the ICCF conferences starting in 2014 in Daejeon.”
The evaluation and presentations on Brillouin technology continued through 2018 with ERC performing independent verification and validation (IV&V) at SRI, which “allowed us to continue performing this IV&V effort while maintaining our independence from BEC,” says Tanzella.
From the Brillouin Energy Corp. website.
Energy Research Center, LLC
In 2018, SRI eliminated virtually all physical science laboratories, and Tanzella retired. Wanting to continue the work in cold fusion, he was able to take materials and equipment from the now-closed lab and incorporate in California as Energy Research Center, LLC [see LinkedIn]. Filling out the new space with purchases from former researchers, Tanzella continued to provide IV&V of BEC’s calorimetry results under a contract with Anthropocene Institute [website].
After a decade of evaluating Brillouin Energy Corp lab results at both SRI and ERC LLC, Fran helped BEC design and build a mass flow calorimeter still in use today.
Tanzella says, “I continue to work closely with BEC, analyzing their results and attending their weekly Engineering meeting. I have continued presenting their results at every ICCF since 2014.”
