Ludwik Kowalski (7/9/05)
Department of Mathematical Sciences
Montclair State University, Upper Montclair, NJ, 07043
The iESiUSA website <www.iesiusa.com> has an item that I do not
remember seeing several days ago. It is a one-year-old paper entitled
“Alternative energies are looking good again.” The author, Michael
Kanellos, is a writer. Here is the first sentence: “Companies promoting
solar power and other alternative-energy concepts are rapidly
attracting venture funding, research grants and, just as important, the
interest of many of the tech industry's deep thinkers and influential
figures.” This is followed by comments on the oil crisis, terrorism and
“Enron-related” blackouts in California. Then I see a section about
enormous profits of companies that benefited from investments in new
technology fields.
As a physics teacher I should not miss an opportunity to correct a
common error. A scientist or engineer would not say [the device] “will
crank out 360,000 kilowatt hours of electricity a year;” s/he would say
it “would crank electricity at the rate of 360,000 kWh.” This is not
the only mistake I see. The sentence: “The light excites an electron
and prompts it to split with its corresponding ‘hole,’ or positive
charge.” is even more disturbing. Photons do not excite electrons, they
excite atoms and molecules. And electrons do not “split with” holes.
Yes, I know the author is not a scientist; but I can not resist
correcting such things.
Contrary to my expectation, the article turned out to be devoted to
technologies of photovoltaic cells; I expected it to shed some light on
the iESiUSA technology. That is why I am disappointed. When will we
hear from people who witnessed the June, 2005 demonstration in
Edmonton? According to the Internet rumors, Martin Fleischmann was only
one of several qualified witnesses. When will the revolutionary devices
be described on the company’s website? When will company scientists
share with us what they understand? The longer I wait the more
pessimistic I become about the three iESiUSA promises.
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