Water-powered car

{{Bronze}}{{pseudosciencenav}}
{{cquote|There is no gas shortage, man. It's all fake. The oil companies control everything. Like, there is this guy that invented this car and it runs on water, man. It's got a fiberglass air-cooled engine and it runs on water.|||Steven Hyde, a character in the ''That '70s Show''<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20171228144405/https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0165598/quotes/?tab=qt&ref_=tt_trv_qu That '70s Show (1998–2006): Quotes] ''IMDb''.</ref>}}
'''"Water-powered" cars''' are a recurrent theme amongst [[free energy (pseudoscience)|free energy]] advocates. The appeal of the idea is rooted in the fact that [[water]] is much more common than, and usually<ref>[http://www.businessinsider.com/oil-is-cheaper-than-milk-and-water-2016-1 Oil is cheaper than milk and water] by Mark Melin (Jan. 20, 2016, 8:26 AM) ''Business Insider''.</ref> cheaper than, [[oil]], especially during an [[energy crisis]].

In one variant of the idea, some [[magic|magical]] substance is added to water, making it combustible and turning it into a fuel that can be fed to an internal combustion engine. In another, the "fuel" is often referred to as '''HHO Water''' (not to be confused with [[Fun:Dihydrogen monoxide|dihydrogen monoxide]]). In the purported generators, water is apparently changed into "[[HHO gas]]", [[electron|electrons]] from which can be used to make cars run. Sometimes, it's claimed that [[hydrogen]] gas is produced — thus making use of existing hydrogen fuel cells.<ref>[https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3011884/just-add-h20-go-chinese-firm-claims-its-hydrogen-powered-car-can Just add H<sub>2</sub>0 to go? Chinese firm claims its hydrogen-powered car can travel 500km fuelled by water] by Laurie Chen (7:55pm, 26 May, 2019) ''South China Morning Post''.</ref>

==Genepax==
One particular example is the Genepax car, revealed in [[Japan]] in 2008. While quite tight-lipped about specific processes, Genepax hinted that the car worked along similar lines to metal hydride reactions that produce hydrogen. Once this hydrogen was produced, it could be consumed in the same manner as working hydrogen fuel cells. However, with a metal hydride reactant being consumed in the process, the "fuel" component certainly wouldn't be water. Depending on the specific chemical reaction used, it may have been less efficient than other methods of hydrogen generation, and less environmentally friendly than even [[fossil fuel]] reactions. Genepax ceased trading and production in 2009, probably in case they were called out on their [[scam]]. The website, however, was still available until at least 2019,<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20190212075612/http://www.genepax.com/ genepax.com], 12 February 2019.</ref> but [[enshittification|eventually devolved]] into a spam site.

==Daniel Dingel==
A widely publicised case in the Philippines during the late 90s to early 2000s was that of {{wpl|Daniel Dingel||,}} a Filipino 
fraudster
 inventor who claimed to have converted his {{wpl|Toyota Corolla (E110)|1996 Toyota Corolla}} to run on just ordinary water. Dingel said he started work on a hydrogen reactor in 1969, culminating in his crimson [[kookmobile]] with writings scrawled all over the body attesting to its supposed energy source which was said to rely on electrolysis. While hydrogen fuel cells have indeed been used to power cars, his method drew suspicion as it relied on a commodity internal combustion engine rather than a fuel cell power plant.<ref>Alarilla, Joey G. [https://web.archive.org/web/20001201234200/http://www.inquirer.net/issues/aug99/aug12/features/fea_main.htm Maker of water-powered car still fighting after 30 years.] ''Philippine Daily Inquirier''.</ref> As is typical with crackpot "inventors", Dingel never divulged the supposed secret to his invention,<ref>Though somehow he was able to file a [https://patents.google.com/patent/US20040202905 patent] for it at the USPTO.</ref> instead playing the victim card and alleging a conspiracy involving the Philippine government and/or petroleum companies who were supposedly trying to shut him up. He was later charged with fraud when he allegedly defrauded the Formosa Plastics Group of $400,000 as he failed to produce a working prototype, refusing to answer emails when the firm pressed him about the status of the project.<ref>Lopez, Allison. [https://web.archive.org/web/20081226045539/http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/inquirerheadlines/nation/view/20081220-179008/Inventor-82-gets-20-years-for-estafa Inventor, 82, gets 20 years for ‘estafa’.] ''Philippine Daily Inquirier''.</ref> Despite being exposed as a shyster and a fraud, patriotic favor nevertheless ensued, and Filipinos still hailed Dingel as a martyr of sorts, especially given the country's dependence on imported petroleum.

==Stanley Meyer==
[[File:Perpetual motion.svg|thumb|340px|HHO production and similar fuel cells are effectively no different to perpetual motion. It's absurd to think you can get energy out of an energy cycle you never put energy into.]]
[[File:Water fuel cell capacitor.png|thumb|right|A diagram from Stanley Meyer's water fuel cell patent.<ref>[https://www.google.com/patents/US5149407 Process and apparatus for the production of fuel gas and the enhanced release of thermal energy from such gas] U.S. Patent 5,149,407.</ref>]]

The water fuel cell claimed by Stanley Meyer appeared in the 1990s and involved modifying existing combustion engines to take fuel directly. Meyer's supposed mechanism involved utilising hydrogen-oxygen reactions to power the engine and consumed electricity (in his "fuel cell") to split water into these components — overlapping it with the concept of the [[perpetual motion machine]], as mentioned by Phillip Ball writing in the journal ''Nature''.<ref>[http://www.nature.com/news/2007/070914/full/news070910-13.html Nature — Burning water and other myths]</ref> Meyer was convicted of fraud in 1996 over the claims made in his [[patent|patents]], and died of an aneurysm in 1998. [[True Believer]]s exploited his death as evidence of a [[free energy suppression]] [[conspiracy theory]] involving oil companies. [[PESWiki]], for example, doesn't even refer to it as a conspiracy theory, simply saying that his death is "mysterious," and due to poisoning.<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20060718133312/http://peswiki.com/index.php/Directory:Stanley_Meyer PESWiki &mdash; Stanley Meyer]</ref>

The apparent perpetual motion issue with Meyer's technology is avoided with a [[handwave]] known as "frequency enhanced electrolysis."<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20110619212345/http://pesn.com/2011/06/15/9501847_Eric_Hansens_Water_Fuel_Hydroxy_Manifesto Eric Hansen's Water Fuel Hydroxy Manifesto]</ref> This is essentially claiming to re-write basic laws of [[science]] and [[chemistry]], such as Faraday's Law of electrolysis and [[conservation of energy]], by claiming that boosts in efficiency will solve the problem. Now, it is true that the efficiency of physical processes can improve with resonant frequencies. [[Gravity]], for example, exhibits resonance effects when the orbital periods of planets begin to coincide; [[nuclear magnetic resonance]] uses resonant frequencies to tilt the magnetic moments of [[atom|atomic]] nuclei, despite the resistance to such a tilt by the very-high-power applied magnetic field. Resonant processes are very real physical phenomena, but they do not violate conservation of energy in the same way that any water-powered system must do. Resonance is only a method of increasing efficiency of a process from close to 0% to close to 100% &mdash; any perpetual motion machine based around using water must go well above 100% to be useful.

==Description==
[[File:Potassium water 20.theora.ogv|thumb|left|Alkali metals react violently with water, producing heat and hydrogen, which may catch fire. But running your car on water and potassium pellets may be ''a bit'' expensive]]

Water is an extremely thermodynamically stable molecule, hence its abundance on [[Earth]] and the fact that it is the product of many oxidation reactions, including the burning of hydrocarbon fuels. As a result of this, energy must be put into the water molecule to break it up and produce a hydrogen-oxygen mix, just over 280 kJ/mol.<ref>[http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/thermo/electrol.html Hyperphysics &mdash; Electrolysis of water]</ref> To put this value in perspective, converting a litre of water into hydrogen and oxygen would require approximately the same amount of energy as the recommended daily calorie intake (~2500 kCal) of an adult human. Conversely, burning enough hydrogen and oxygen to form a litre of water would ''release'' this much energy.

It is true that hydrogen gas will react with oxygen to produce energy, and that the only product of this reaction is water. This is the principle of a fuel cell. So you do get this energy back, but you cannot just magically get this from water without putting energy in first. The energy that needs to be put in to generate hydrogen and oxygen, due to the laws of microscopic reversibility and thermodynamics, is ''exactly the same'' as the energy that is produced by the hydrogen and oxygen reaction.

The popularity of the water power scam may be due to the misconception that hydrogen is some form of fuel, when really it's a form of short-term energy storage. Hydrogen fuel cell cars can only be powered by hydrogen if water is first broken into a hydrogen/oxygen mixture &mdash; the energy required to achieve this is the theoretical maximum that can be obtained from the fuel cell. As we don't find hydrogen lying around naturally on the Earth's surface (the presence of oxygen sees to that), we can't mine it as a ''fuel'' in the same way we do with [[fossil fuel]]s. We ourselves must put that energy in by some means — preferably through [[renewable energy]]. In the Genepax example above, it is suspected that a metal hydride was consumed in the reaction to produce hydrogen from water, hence it would just be transforming energy from one unstable chemical (a metal hydride) to another (hydrogen gas), before burning that to produce water. This isn't particularly miraculous chemistry; many reactive substances will split water into hydrogen and oxygen (magnesium, potassium to name two). But, as these metals don't exist in their pure form in nature and need to be processed first, we have to put energy into forming them before they can release that energy to form hydrogen, before we can burn that to get the energy back.

An analogy can be made that this is like burning a large amount of oil in a conventional power station, to produce the electricity needed to run equipment that produces "artificial" long chain alkane molecules in a lab, then burning ''those'' and calling it a miraculous and environmentally friendly process — in other words, total [[bullshit]].

It's certainly ''possible'' to run a car on water, by electrolyzing it and then burning the hydrogen produced; the only problem is you'll need a second, bigger engine to supply power to the electrolyzer, unless you use solar panels or some other renewable source to electrolyze the water separately and somehow collect and compress the hydrogen into tanks. [[Nuclear fusion|Fusion]] of the hydrogen isotopes present in water could hypothetically provide energy, but even if fusion was common, the miniaturization necessary to install a fusion reactor in a car would probably not be developed while cars were still used.

==Don't miss==
"Like Water for Octane",<ref>The X-Files Wiki: [http://x-files.wikia.com/wiki/Like_Water_for_Octane "Like Water for Octane"]</ref> an episode of ''The Lone Gunmen'', a spinoff of ''[[The X-Files]]'' that ran for only one season in 2001. The plot involves the titular protagonists, a group of conspiracy theorists, searching for a water-powered car that was allegedly suppressed by the oil companies, with shadowy figures pursuing them as they get closer to the truth. Said truth: the car's inventor destroyed it himself upon realizing all the hidden environmental costs of it, particularly how it would fuel suburban sprawl and [[consumerism]] just as cheap gasoline did back in the 1950s. The energy company executives weren't looking for the car's blueprints to shred them, but rather, to hand them over to Detroit in order to keep the consumerist gravy train going even after [[peak oil]].

==See also==
*[[Fun:Dihydrogen monoxide|Dihydrogen monoxide]] (dangerous, even if it's used as a fuel)
*[[Hydrogen economy]], a somewhat plausible idea where cars ''produce'' water
*[[Nanoflowcell]], a [[bullshit]] "salt water-powered" car design and scam found infesting several [[European]] countries

==External links==
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20080630113653/http://www.simplewaterfuel.com/ Simple Water Fuel] - You can play "spot the scam cliché" with this website.
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20100922164626/http://www.motorsportsartist.com/nogod/urban-legend/gas-millage-hoaxes/ Gas Millage Hoaxes]
*[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RIqKS6YQYtQ "It runs on water man…"] - Memorable skit from ''That 70's Show''.

==References==
{{reflist|2|80%}}

[[Category:Water woo]]
[[Category:Free energy]]
[[Category:Automotive woo]]

Categories: Water woo, Free energy, Automotive woo