[syhprum (OP)]

An Italian company is starting to ship cold fusion power generators, at last we can get rid of polluting coal fired plants and stop wasting money on futile research into ITER and such like

http://phys.org/news/2013-11-italian-company-portable-cold-fusion.html#ajTabs

[Bored chemist]

Other forms of fraud are also available.

[alancalverd]

When hydrogen is added, heat and perhaps copper, is produced. According to ECAT, the plant does nothing more than produce heated water and/or steam.

Now that's pretty amazing. The best that nature can manage is helium. Getting nothing but water and copper from a hydrogen fusion reaction is beyond the wildest dreams of alchemy. 

On the other hand, hydrogen + air + catalyst = hot water, as in every other catalytic heater on the planet.

Cold fusion my arse.

[Bored chemist]

I think that most of what will be produced is hot air.

[evan_au]

perhaps another indication that cold fusion simply cannot be done

Knowing 100 ways that cold fusion doesn't work does not prove that it cannot be done.

In this case, the test will be whether the exhaust gases contain primarily water or helium. (or copper?)
And whether, after sealing off all the ways that oxygen can get into the system, the water and heat production stops.

There is already a proven method of "warm" hydrogen fusion (at < 1000C), with meson-catalysed fusion. However, mesons are too short-lived to be a really useful catalyst, and it requires an excessive amount of energy to produce mesons.

[CliffordK]

This has been discussed on TNS a few times in the past:
http://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=36771.0
http://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=39244.0
http://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=39451.0

A couple of years later, it is interesting that Rossi is making more progress towards his generators, which is indicative of either significant investment in the scam, or that he has actually found something.

Following the link above, one finds a link to a paper written about it.  Unfortunately, the inner workings of the device is treated like a black box.  And, "recharging" is to be done by company officials.  So, unfortunately there is no detailed independent analysis of the input/output.

If I was to try to fake one of these devices, I'd probably choose to use nuclear decay, although Rossi may have troubles getting his hands on large amounts of specific isotopes without raising suspicion.