Arcane Atomic Theory May Hold Key To Clean Energy

My brilliant and self-deprecating friend Jim Boyden (Ph.D. in physics from CalTech), asks:  Have you been following this (announcement from Blacklight Power)?  I haven’t looked at it for some time. It all goes back to Mills’ hydrino theory (maybe).  I haven’t watched the entire June 28 two hour demo/business presentation but it is, if nothing else, interesting.

Craig: No, I have not been following them, and you’re going to have to help me here, because, with my limited understanding of physics, this sounds like gibberish to me.  They’re trying to harvest the energy released when the electron in a hydrogen molecule goes down to a lower energy state?  Isn’t it already at its lowest energy state?

Jim: Just because I’m a physicist doesn’t mean I understand what’s going on. Under the “brand” Blacklight Power, now “Brilliant Light Power”, an M.D., Randy Mills, proposed a theory a couple of decades ago that the standard model of the hydrogen atom is not complete, i.e., there is a hidden ground state “below” the one predicted by Bohr et al. He published his theory of “hydrinos” more than a decade ago. I tried wading through his one-inch thick document filled with equations and postulates but didn’t make it. It has been controversial ever since, as has Mills himself with accusations of fraud, nonsense, etc. I haven’t followed it other than casually. Obviously he has been able to get enough funding to build an apparatus, now boldly demonstrated “live” in the video.

Is this real? I don’t know and it would be really difficult to find out. He claims to have a set of “validators” with excellent credentials and I guess that would be the place to start. It could still be fraudulent, or self-deceivingly wrong, or it could be world-changing in the same way commercially successful fusion would be. I think the claims of an “energy amplifier” are too important to ignore out of hand.

Craig: In that case, I will definitely not ignore this.  Maybe I’ll try to get an interview with someone, and see if I can sense where this is going.  Of course, you are far more likely than I to figure this out first; I hope you’ll keep me posted.