Plasmas of certain catalysts such as Sr+ and Ar+ mixed with hydrogen were studied for evidence of a novel energetic reaction. These hydrogen plasmas called resonant transfer- or rt-plasmas were observed to form at low temperatures (e.g. approximate to 10(3) K) and extraordinary low field strengths of about 1-2 V/cm when argon and strontium were present with atomic hydrogen. Time-dependent line broadening of the H Balmer alpha line was observed corresponding to extraordinarily fast H (25 eV). When an argon-hydrogen hollow-anode glow discharge plasma with strontium metal contained in the cell was optimized for Sr+ emission, an average hydrogen hot atom temperature of 50.2 eV with a 83.5% population and an excess power of 28.5% of the input power were observed. Using water bath calorimetry, an excess power of 2.85 W was measured on rt-plasmas with Sr+ and Ar+ as catalysts and atomic hydrogen as a reactant, compared with controls with no hydrogen and no catalyst present. The energy balance was high. Given an argon-hydrogen (95/5%) flow rate of 1.0 seem and an average excess power of 2.85 W. energy balances of over -7.7 x 10(4) kJ/mol H-2 were measured. (C) 2007 International Association for Hydrogen Energy. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.