This more recent paper from McKubre addresses some of the questions IO is asking:
LENR – What We must Do to Complete Martin Fleischmann’s Undertaking, Michael C.H. McKubre, Journal of Condensed Matter Nuclear Science 26 (2018)
http://www.iscmns.org/CMNS/JCMNS-Vol26.pdf#page=6
In this paper, McKubre points out the need for a device that can demonstrate the feasibility of LENR as a useful power source. Without such a demo, even if you accept the existence of LENR, you may conclude that it has no more practical importance than something like muon-catalyzed fusion. A demonstration is needed to show the critical difference between a scientific curiosity and something that industry and governments need to pay attention to
Of all of the experiments he cites, he focuses on one with high enough power and figure-of-merit (aka COP) to allow closing the loop by generating the input power from the output power to make it self-sustaining:
"Representing Energetics Technologies (Incorporated and operating in Israel as ETI but headquartered in New Jersey) Arik
El-Boher presented at ICCF10 [15] what was then and remains today one of the most exciting discoveries in Pd–D heat studies. Energetics struck a super-wave modulated glow discharge between thoriated tungsten and a thin palladium coating (on stainless steel) in sub-atmospheric D2. The experiment produced boiling water with a power gain of 3.88 and an energy gain of 6.72 (because of conspicuous “heat after death”) over a periodof 10 h."
This sounds exciting, but the Energetics paper was from 2003 and could not be replicated:
"Because the temperature of the plasma was quite high (although unmeasured) one can easily conceive
of a demonstration prototype but this experiment has not been replicated to my knowledge despite the best
efforts of El-Boher, Energetics and SKINR"
I think this is the crux of the problem that IO is talking about. The field is filled with papers describing promising ideas that then vanish or stall at levels that prevent them from becoming practical or even demonstrable power sources. This is much different than most other technologies that make steady progress and get better over time. Maybe Jed is right that the reality of LENR is proven, but IO is right that the reality of useful LENR is far from proven.