Cold fusion and the Energy Department (1999)
From the UAP Encyclopedia, the open encyclopedia of UFO and UAP history · 🗓️ Event
Contents 8
| Date | 17 May 1999 |
|---|---|
| Topics | Nuclear & missile sites (topic), Congress & law (topic) |
| Testimony | Shellenberger testimony, p. 140 |
| Year | 1999 in UFO history |
| Timeline | 1999 on the UAP Timeline |
| Sources | 8 |
On 17 May 1999, journalist Hal Plotkin wrote in SF Gate, the online San Francisco Chronicle, that electrochemist Michael McKubre of SRI International had reported strong evidence of cold fusion, and accused the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) of neglecting or suppressing the field.[1]
McKubre's talk
Plotkin reported on McKubre's presentation at the American Physical Society's centennial meeting, which he said about 100 scientists and only one journalist attended. SRI in Menlo Park had spent nearly ten years trying to replicate the 1989 claims of chemists Martin Fleischmann and Stanley Pons. Using a calorimeter precise to a thousandth of a degree, McKubre reported excess heat under controlled conditions and raised levels of helium-4, a fusion by-product, and argued the reaction appeared to be nuclear.[1][2]
Plotkin's accusations
Plotkin said the DOE's 1989 review panel had leaned heavily on a Massachusetts Institute of Technology experiment, and cited Eugene Mallove, formerly MIT's chief science writer, who alleged that MIT's original heat graph had been replaced with an "adjusted" version. He called for an investigation and said Energy Secretary Bill Richardson should answer questions. He blamed the opposition on fossil-fuel interests and on physicists protecting hot-fusion budgets, though he offered no direct evidence of a coordinated effort.[1]
Background
Fleischmann and Pons announced cold fusion in 1989; most laboratories could not reproduce it, and the DOE reviewed the field in 1989 and again in 2004 without recommending a major program. A small research community continued under the name "low-energy nuclear reactions".[2][3]
UFO connection
Some UFO writers cite the episode as an example of advanced energy research being held back. That link is speculative; most physicists regard cold fusion as unproven.[3]
People and topics
- Department of Energy — The U.S. department that runs the nuclear weapons laboratories.
- SRI International — The research institute where the government's remote-viewing studies began.
- Unidentified anomalous phenomena — The U.S. government's current term for unidentified objects in the air, in space and underwater.
- U.S. Navy — The U.S. naval service, whose pilots reported the UAP encounters revealed in 2017.
On the Timeline
- David Adair's Area 51 engine claim (1999) — Engineer David Adair says he saw a strange craft at Groom Lake.
- Puthoff–Green emails on a pseudonymous article (31 July 1999) — Puthoff emails Kit Green about a UFO magazine story.
See every 1999 event on the UAP Timeline →
References
- Hal Plotkin, "The war against cold fusion: what's really behind it?", SF Gate (May 1999) · plotkin.com · archived copy
- Michael McKubre — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org · archived copy
- Cold fusion — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org · archived copy
- Power to the people: the return of cold fusion — Hal Plotkin · plotkin.com · archived copy
- Cold fusion back from the dead — IEEE Spectrum · spectrum.ieee.org · archived copy
- bibliotecapleyades.net · bibliotecapleyades.net · archived copy
- patentimages.storage.googleapis.com · patentimages.storage.googleapis.com · archived copy
- nytimes.com · nytimes.com · archived copy
Further reading
- Stargate Project — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org · archived copy
- Stargate collection — CIA Reading Room · cia.gov · archived copy
- Los Alamos National Laboratory — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org · archived copy
- U.S. congressional hearings on UFOs — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org · archived copy
This page was last edited on 29 October 2026. Articles are written in our own words from the sources listed under References; disputed claims are attributed to the people who made them.
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