As the world faces climate change and energy crises, the National Taiwan Normal University's Institute for Interdisciplinary Science and Technology Industrial Innovation, in collaboration with Jiangling Group, has announced a major breakthrough in cold fusion technology. This low-energy nuclear reaction (LENR) technology uses water as fuel to conduct nuclear reactions at low temperatures without the risk of nuclear contamination. The intermediate products are also expected to have medical applications.
Nuclear fusion is often seen as humanity's ideal, inexhaustible source of clean energy for the future. However, traditional nuclear fusion requires extremely high temperatures to release large amounts of energy. Recently, a research team led by Huang Bingjun, Chair Professor of the Institute of Green Energy Technology and Sustainable Governance at the College of Industrial Innovation at National Taiwan Normal University and Executive Director of the Jiangling Group's Creative Energy Research Center, has developed a low-energy nuclear reaction (LENR), also known as "cold fusion," technology. This technology not only allows nuclear reactions to occur at temperatures far below those currently considered acceptable, but also eliminates the release of neutrons and gamma radiation, significantly reducing the risk of nuclear contamination.
Nuclear reactions stimulated by water as fuel
In 2013, Huang Bingjun stumbled upon two Taiwanese companies developing machines that could generate excess heat from water. Further research revealed that both technologies were related to the cavitation and sonoluminescence phenomena produced by boiling water. With support from the Ministry of Science and Technology, Huang Bingjun officially began his exploration of nuclear energy technology in 2019.
When the fundamental theory remained unclear, the research team first implemented and tested the technology before deducing the design and operating principles. In the process, they independently designed and manufactured dozens of reactors and even proposed a completely new theory of physics.
The LENR technology developed by the team is a type of CIF (cavitation-induced fusion) that uses water as a fuel, operates at temperatures below 200°C, and utilizes fluid dynamics and cavitation techniques to stimulate nuclear reactions. This technology offers advantages such as reproducibility, high-power continuous operation, and low cost. Its coefficient of performance (COP) (ratio of output energy to input energy) can reach 1.2 to 4.3.
This cold fusion technology utilizes a portion of the hot steam output from steam boilers to operate, achieving energy conservation and carbon reduction benefits for power plants. With an estimated reactor COP of 2.0, this technology can generate twice the energy required to preheat boiler feed water, reducing boiler fuel consumption by approximately 20% and increasing power plant efficiency from the current 40% to 50%.
If the COP can be raised to above 5.0, it is expected that water can be used directly to stimulate the energy generated by nuclear reactions and drive steam turbines to generate electricity, thus realizing an energy revolution in water-based power generation.
Not only can it generate electricity, it may also be used for cancer treatment
In 2021, Huang Bingjun retired from National Taiwan University and became a Chair Professor at National Taiwan Normal University, where he helped promote cross-disciplinary industry-university collaborations. His cold fusion research team then moved to the Yangjie Creative Energy Research Center within Jiangling Group, focusing on the development of engineering application systems. They set two major goals: first, to provide sufficient scientific evidence to gain mainstream scientific acceptance of cold fusion; second, to develop a simple reactor that can be scaled up to power plant scale.
In 2023, the research team achieved a major breakthrough. They discovered that when cold fusion occurs, the reactor produces a non-condensable gas. Mass spectrometry revealed that the gas contains neon isotopes (22Ne), carbon dioxide (CO2), heavy water with the isotope O17 (H217O), CO2 isotopes (12C-16O-17O), and O2 isotopes (16O-17O).
After countless repeated experiments, it was confirmed that water was stimulating a certain nuclear reaction and producing energy. It was also discovered that the O17 isotope was a key intermediate in the nuclear reaction, which was a major discovery in energy technology.
This research result was first reported at the 25th International Conference of Condensed Matter Nuclear Science (ICCF-25) held in Poland in August 2023, and the formal paper was published in the journal Nature – Scientific Reports in January 2024.
This is the first time in 30 years that a cold fusion paper has been published in a mainstream scientific journal. It has been downloaded over 140,000 times, ranking in the top 1.8% of global papers. It has also been included in the National Library of Medicine of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), attracting attention from foreign media.
In addition, the research team also discovered that the isotope O17 heavy water has important medical value and can be used as a contrast agent for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and the main material for positron emission tomography (PET).
Studies have shown that O17 heavy water may have the potential to inhibit cancer cell growth and may assist in targeted cancer therapy or radiotherapy. However, the difficulty and high cost of producing O17 heavy water currently hinder large-scale clinical research. Huang Bingjun's team's cold fusion technology is expected to address this challenge and open up new avenues for related medical applications.
Building Jiufen into a "Zero-Carbon Green Energy Park"
Jiangling Group Chairman Lin Meidong stated that starting from 2023, the group will sign a long-term industry-university cooperation agreement with the Institute of Green Energy Technology and Sustainable Governance of the College of Industrial Innovation at National Taiwan Normal University to jointly promote "zero-carbon green energy innovative technology demonstration and forward-looking academic research."
The two parties plan to build a distinctive "zero-carbon green energy park" in Jiufen, showcasing technologies including small-scale microclimate technology (cold spring dehumidification, local cooling, spray cooling), multifunctional energy storage technology, pyramid solar microgrid technology, and cold fusion.
"Industry-university collaboration is a two-way process," said Wu Cheng-chi, president of National Taiwan Normal University. This program will not only promote innovative research and development from academia to industry, but will also bring industry innovations into academic discussions, helping to accelerate the integration of science and technology and cultivate students' scientific research capabilities that balance theory and practice.
In addition to application development, Professor Huang Bingjun is also organizing domestic and international research teams to conduct in-depth research on the basic nuclear reaction mechanism of LENR, in order to unravel the mystery of cold fusion and pave the way for more efficient cold fusion application technology.
※ This article is reprinted with permission from ESG Today. The original title is "Using water as fuel, low-temperature nuclear reaction, National Taiwan Normal University's "cold fusion" technology breakthrough! Not only does it eliminate the risk of nuclear contamination, it also has the potential to treat cancer." It is not subject to the CC license.
The team has published 5 cold fusion papers:
• Water can trigger nuclear reaction to produce energy and isotope gases. Scientific Reports, Doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-023-50824-8
• Peculiar Phenomena Observed in Low-Energy Nuclear Reactors. 2024 American Nuclear Society Annual Meeting.
• Excess Energy from Heat-Exchange Systems. J. Condensed Matter Nucl.
• Excess Energy from Heat-Exchange Systems. The 23th International Conference of Condensed Matter Nuclear Science (ICCF-23), Xiamen, China, June 9-11, 2021.
• Excess Energy from a Vapor Compression System. The 22th International Conference of Condensed Matter Nuclear Science (ICCF-22).
Sources: Environmental Information Center
