Excess Heat: Why Cold Fusion Research Prevailed [Paperback]

Charles G. Beaudette (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0967854814 | ISBN-13: 978-0967854816 | Publication Date: May 15, 2000 | Edition: 1st

An investigative report prepared for the general reader to explain how the most extraordinary claim made in the basic sciences during the twentieth century was mistakenly dismissed through errors of scientific protocol.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Excess Heat is an extremely important and timely book. Mr. Beaudette has done a thorough job... -- Sir Arthur C. Clarke, author of 2001: A Space Odyssey

This is a book that has been sorely needed for many years. -- Peter L. Hagelstein, MIT Professor of Electrical Engineering

About the Author

Charles Beaudette graduated in 1952 from MIT with a bachelor of science in electrical engineering. After selling the instrument company which he founded (Dychro Corporation) in 1961, he worked for ten years with EG&G Corporation, where he specialized in image processing. During this time he participated in the technology development for what became the office facsimile and the PC modem. He is now retired and lives in Cumberland, Maine.

Product Details

• Paperback: 389 pages
• Publisher: Oak Grove Pr Llc; 1st edition (May 15, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0967854814
• ISBN-13: 978-0967854816
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,163,749 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Charles Beaudette was born in Boston in 1930. He attended Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Mass., where he majored in electrical engineering and held the position of managing editor of The Tech, the official student newspaper. He was awarded the degree of Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering in 1952.
In 1958 he started Dychro Corporation and sold it to a computer company in 1961. From 1963 to 1973 he was employed by EG&G Corporation in Wellesley, Massachusetts, in the capacity of senior engineer and engineering manager. It was during this time that he participated in the technology development for what eventually became the office facsimile, and which work included development of what is now the PC modem. From this activity, Mr. Beaudette was issued a patent on image processing for variable speed page scanning and transmission.
Beaudette has three children and lives in South Bristol, Maine, with his wife.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An Important and Very Interesting Book, July 10, 2000

By 

Carroll Chubb (Saskatoon, SK, Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Excess Heat: Why Cold Fusion Research Prevailed (Paperback)

In 1989 two scientists announced that in experiments with hydrogen and metal they had measured heat in excess of what known processes could produce. They hypothesized that fusion of two hydrogen atoms to form helium was the source of the heat. The study of energy production in hydrogen-metal experiments is usually referred to as cold fusion research. Excess Heat probably will be considered the definitive history of the early years of the cold fusion controversy. The author argues convincingly that cold fusion was dismissed as a mistake by most scientific institutions before proper experimental evaluation. Research on cold fusion has continued over the last 10 years and the book shows that the observation of excess heat is now well established by normal scientific criteria. The author presents the scientific evidence, the arguments from both supporters and critics, as well as the findings of experts who visited labs involved in cold fusion research. The author also comments on the psychological factors involved in the cold fusion controversy. In addition, the book touches on evidence from several labs for the formation of nuclear reaction products, such as helium, when the excess heat is produced. Excess Heat is an important book and so interesting that I found it hard to put down.

18 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent book, November 29, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Excess Heat: Why Cold Fusion Research Prevailed (Paperback)

This book is a magnum opus on this fascinating field. Together with Fire from Ice : Searching for the Truth Behind the Cold Fusion Furor by Eugene J. Mallove, this is one book you really need to read. Not only because it is highly interesting, and a great work and example of what really good scholarship means, but also because it is very readable, detailed, honest and accurate. It provides a excellent insight about the early days of cold fusion, the confusion, and the later shortsighted, stupid rejection of the entire field by scientific establishment and mainstream media. The latter can be forgiven, they have no knowledge nor interest in the truth, but the scientists are really to blame. As you can see from previous reviews posted here by exceptional great minds like Arthur C. Clarke, prof. Bockris, and others, this is no joke at all. This is pure, honest, cutting edge science. This is the frontier thinking and research that made our age of technology possible. This is the science the world is needing so badly. Mr. Baudette has done a excellent job of presenting the fact and history of this exciting field of science. For people like him, and like Mallove, Clarke, Bockris, Pons & Fleischmann, and many, many others, I personally have the deepest respect. The truth will come out, one day. Let the critics state one desperate non-argument after the other - this is stuff is for real, and it's here to stay, boys and girls! And it's going to change our world for the better - sooner than you think. I wish I could rate this book 6 stars.

14 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An Outsider's View of Cold Fusion Research, July 3, 2000

By 

Ed Wall (Concord, NH USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Excess Heat: Why Cold Fusion Research Prevailed (Paperback)

Mr. Beaudette is a retired accomplished electrical engineer who dedicated his mind and free time to investigating this field for years, as I have done. This is a book I would have like to have written because he has put the strange events surrounding the birth of this science into a form that is accessible by anyone with a basic understanding of science. Without evoking the spectre of conspiracies, one can understand how normal human behavior, distorted by the intensity of media attention, mixed with the proprietary requirements of private research, protection of research grants, and other questionable motives has gotten the field into the present situation. Beaudette leaves no room for doubt about the reality of the effects, in a simple way, by focusing on the simplest evidence, reproduced by the best of laboratories. It was truly a pleasurable reading experience.