Japanese Company Says Laws of Physics Don't Apply — to Cars

Fantastic Lad, among many others, points out another in a long series of claimed "powered by water" cars, this one by a Japanese company called "Genepax," which interestingly enough does not have so much as a Wikipedia entry. What's scary is the uncritical, even serious-sounding, presentation by Reuters of such extraordinary claims quite unbacked by extraordinary evidence. "Almost sounds too good to be true" isn't the half of it; if cars could be made which would run as "long as you have a bottle of water inside" to pour into the fuel tank ("even tea," repeats this report), not only would you know about the car, but you'd notice the long lines of people buying generators, laptops, and power tools that run on the same technology. The snippet Reuters is carrying says "Jun. 13 — Japanese company Genepax presents its eco-friendly car that runs on nothing but water. The car has an energy generator that extracts hydrogen from water that is poured into the car's tank. The generator then releases electrons that produce electric power to run the car. Genepax, the company that invented the technology, aims to collaborate with Japanese manufacturers to mass produce it." Fantastic Lad, deadpan, goes on: "Check out the Reuter's story and accompanying video. Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't there some sort of conservation of energy thing happening in the whole 'separating hydrogen from water' game? I wonder what the real story is on this. Investment fraud? Magic?" Show your work; bonus points if you use Haiku.

Screw water

[ijakings (982830)]

I want my Mr fusion and I want it now!

Re:Screw water

[DaedalusHKX (660194)]

Actually when I first got into extreme overclocking for gaming back in the Athlon Slot A and Celeron A days, I remember that we were told that peltiers were the way to go and were only going to move as much heat as they consumed power. Someone even derided an article I wrote mentioning that small Airconditioner was the way to go for extreme cooling. When companies such as Asetek picked it up and made their VapoChill case, the "all knowing" geeks screamed that it was against all the laws of conservation of energy if a 10-50 watt AC unit could move 200 watts of heat... it was 'unpossible' they screamed.

Strangely, having built and designed air conditioning units for some time, and having done a LOT of installations, I have a few ideas on how the laws of physics can be exploited to use LESS energy to accomplish a job that normally requires MORE energy. Air Conditioning is only one of the visible uses of compression and decompression as well as radiation of heat in order to transfer heat for a much smaller energy cost than the standard peltier technology once used for "extreme cooling" in computers.

Refrigeration technology is OLD and works admirably well. Until I see a proof and more than just a "not possible" debunking, I will remain skeptical of the claim and of its eager debunkers. Just my 10 cents.

Re:Screw water

[Geoffrey.landis (926948)]

The laws of physics apply to air conditioning too; basically they say that you have to reject heat somewhere, and the amount of heat you reject has to be more than the amount of heat that you move (that is, you can't use the rejected heat to run an engine to power the airconditioner).

You can use less energy to accomplish a job, but you can't use no energy. That's what these cars (apparently) seem to claim-- they are running on NO energy-- they (use energy to) split the water into hydrogen and oxyen, then burn the hydrogen and oxygen to get the energy to split the water, and have extra energy left over. This is not "refrigeration technology"-- this is magic.

With that said, let me say that I wrote "apparently" in the previous paragraph, because I haven't actually seen the Japanese text, only the news articles, and I know that news articles often miss a key point, or two-- for all I know this may actually be a perfectly functional car, and the reporter screwed up the article. It could be a fuel-cell car, for example, powered off the grid (which could be said to "run on water", although not in a perpetual-motion closed cycle.)

Re:Screw water

[by Anonymous Coward]

Yes, it is a fuel-cell [fuelcelltoday.com]. Here's an article [nikkeibp.co.jp] some pictures as well.

Re:Screw water

[RickRussellTX (755670)]

The article makes it pretty clear (emphasis mine):

... According to Genepax, the main feature of the new system is that it uses the company's membrane electrode assembly (MEA), which contains a material capable of breaking down water into hydrogen and oxygen through a chemical reaction.

Their fuel cell has a chemical in it which is consumed when it splits water into hydrogen and oxygen. Eventually, that chemical will be consumed and need to be replaced. That's where the energy comes from. The guy in the suit is just lying about the external inputs to a credulous reporter.

Re:Screw water

[osu-neko (2604)]

Yes, we all know the laws of physics apply to air conditioning. What GP was pointing out is that geeks like to "debunk" claims by claiming something violates the laws of physics when it fact it does not, they simply don't understand what's occuring.

There's not enough information in the Reuters article to validate or debunk the operation of this car. Therefore, a large number of geeks have made a large number of assumptions about what hasn't been said, then "proven" it impossible by showing it doesn't work under the set of assumptions they made. In short, they've proven nothing.

Re:Screw water

[Cctoide (923843)]

I'm going to invent a car that runs on strawmen.

Check back tomorrow for the press release.

Re:Screw water

[Eil (82413)]

No, you're absolutely right. Every few months someone comes out with this "running cars on water" thing, and every time it's the same technology. Notice the following quote in the article:

"The car has an energy generator that extracts hydrogen from water that is poured into the car's tank."

This device isn't an energy generator at all, it's a device which requires electricity in order to separate the hydrogen from the oxygen. (I think this is called hydrolysis?) The end result is that you end up expending more energy trying to get at the hydrogen than you get back from burning it. The stories about "water cars" in the popular media always gloss over this little detail.

So yes, it's perfectly possible to make a car that uses water as fuel, but the chemical reactions required to make it work require a lot of electricity which presently is neither cheap nor clean.

Re:Screw water

[DaedalusHKX (660194)]

An idea that i'd like to present is that, for the most part, even the oil system we have today, depends on burning more resources than it pulls out, but the costs are largely hidden from the consumer. The "energy" industry of today is largely the same thing. This shit we're burning today had to come from somewhere. Call it resources, call it a zit in the earth or magic beans, but the question is... how much energy is burned up moving this stuff around, refining it, marketing it, selling it, etc. I bet if you did the math like some have, you'd notice that liquid fuel extraction (petroleum based) you'd discover that a lot of it is wasted merely to further extract MORE of it. All in all, its a losing game either way. Perhaps less energy should be wasted debunking things based only on mere assumptions, and actually figuring something new out.

For a bunch of "geeks" and "science nerds" I'm seeing a lot of bullshit and very little science. If you don't have solutions, why don't you get together with someone who can think and come up with a few? Can't hurt, seeing as to how science has been reduced to verifying predominant dogmas and outright rejecting any other possibilities.

Strangely, if your dogmas were to be followed, quantum mechanics would've been an outright pipe dream. Strangely, as far as our current means go, this stuff has proven pretty eye opening, if nothing else.

Question to ask is: if we've been hoodwinked into believing so much other shit before, even by our teachers, from the world being flat, to flies manifesting on rotten meat, to the various other propagandas of our age... what else have we been lied to or mislead about? Instead of immediately debunking things based on preaching, perhaps a second look at "HOW" something might be done, would be eye opening, would it not? Almost like the arguments that free markets don't work, when a truly free market has rarely existed because governments have been quick to destroy them, lest people gain some measure of autonomy through exchanges of value based on consent, rather than lies, misinformation and government coercion and controls.

Try figuring out how it COULD be done, rather than bitching about something we all were taught in high school. By the way, I still remember my mathematics professor telling me that that there were no numbers other than positive and negative. Guess her education was weaker than mine and when I asked her about the posible results of radicals from negative roots, she turned pale white, having a kid explain to her how that stuff should work in front of her class. Yeah, that kind of shit is what makes me not believe that teachers, professors and doctors know it all. Most only know what they've been TOLD to know, and believe only what they've been TOLD to believe.

A guy that went by Teilhard de Chardin, long ago, said something to the effect of "in the cosmos, only the fantastic has a chance of being real."

Given that everything we once took to be science fiction or "tools of the devil" are now things we take for granted every day, perhaps the idea that energy is easier to extract than we've been taught by our establishment, may well not be as "unpossible" as we've been taught to believe. Frankly, I've seen entirely too many things in my life to think that its all as simple and cut and dry as school would have us believe.

That is why I simply said, if I see a working sample, or if I am asked to witness such a thing, I will gladly maintain an open mind. Why? I've seen too much weird shit in my life, survived lots of weird shit, and delved in places where I was told not to.

Re:Screw water

[Wavebreak (1256876)]

Just because you're eloquent doesn't mean you aren't a fucking crackpot.

Re:Not saying it's credible at first glance..

[osu-neko (2604)]

Can you not see how this is an impossible self-contained system? You can't convert water to its component gasses and back, and expect to make an energy profit.

Everyone can see that. Can you not see that the person you're replying to insisted that this isn't a closed system?

It's a poorly explained system. It's probably something like this [isa.org]. In any case, a system like this is perfectly workable and does not violate any physical laws. The process to create the hydrogen uses less electricity than the process of burning it. That's not magic, that's chemistry. Eventually, you pay for it when you recycle the aluminum in the linked case. Not sure how it works in the Genepax system, but doubtless it's something similar.

Re:Not saying it's credible at first glance..

[andre.ramaciotti (1053592)]

That link you've sent might have the answer to this problem. They're using an alloy of aluminum and galium that breaks the water molecule, generating aluminum oxide. But then the energy comes from this reaction of Al -> Al2O3 and therefore there's no magic here. In this case you will have 'extra' energy, that will be consumed when reverting the oxidation of the aluminum.

Re:Not saying it's credible at first glance..

[flyingsquid (813711)]

Can you not see how this is an impossible self-contained system? You can't convert water to its component gasses and back, and expect to make an energy profit.

Hello? Did you even watch the video? It's pretty impossible to argue with what the video shows.

The video clearly shows a little, blue car with the words "Water Energy System" in small, green letters. What's more, the car has the words "H2O POWER", in big, white capital letters, written on it. "H20 POWER" is written on the front, the back, AND even the sides, in ALL CAPS so it's impossible to miss that this car uses H20 POWER. If it's NOT powered by water, then how come it says "H2O POWER" all over the car, Mr. Smarty Pants?

If that wasn't enough to silence the skeptics that the car uses H2O POWER, the video features a guy in a suit talking about the car. The fact that the guy talking is wearing a SUIT clearly shows that these guys are professionals, because professional people wear suits. Now, I can't tell what he's saying, because it's in Japanese. But that's not important. The fact that he is saying it in JAPANESE is the important thing. Because that PROVES that he is Japanese! And everyone knows that Japanese people are very, very smart. To top it all off, the video is narrated by a woman with a sophisticated-sounding British accent. The same kind of sophisticated British accent you will hear on the BBC, one of the world's most reliable news organizations. You can't argue with information that is presented with a sophisticated sounding foreign accent.

Re:Screw water

[magisterx (865326)]

http://scienceblogs.com/goodmath/ [scienceblogs.com] has an excellent write up of why this is not possible in the way it should work according to the description.

Re:Screw water

[Oktober Sunset (838224)]

a catalyst does not change the amount of energy released or required for a reaction, it simply reduces the energy maxima, which means the reaction needs less energy to get started, however, the net energy released or required stays the same.

That's how thermodynamics works. What is often the case in these 'fueled by water' things is there is a 'catalyst' that is actually a reactant and that is where the energy comes from, of course as a reactant it all gets used up and must be replaced.

Re:Screw water

[C0vardeAn0nim0 (232451)]

in other words, it's just like lead-acid bateries work. if you still have sulphuric acid in the bottom of the batery, all you have to do is add distilled water to make the solution touch the lead plates, and the reaction gives energy.

Re:Screw water

[c6gunner (950153)]

Doesn't it depend on how much energy is stored in the Hydrogen and Oxygen atoms? Is it more than the energy required to split the molecule? If I remember correctly, normally the answer is no, but adding the right catalyst can change that. If it requires X amount of energy to split the molecule, and the 2 Hydrogen atoms have 2X energy, then you have energy left over to drive your car.

The problem is that when you "use" hydrogen to create electricity, the hydrogen recombines with oxygen to become water once again. So let me use some fictional numbers here to demonstrate why your suggestion is impossible:

1. Assume it takes 1 joule of energy to split a water molecule.
2. Assume you get back 2 joules of energy when you "use" the hydrogen.
3. You now have the same water molecule you started with, and a surplus of 1 joule of energy.

Where did that energy come from? It'd be one hell of a magic trick if you could pull it off! That's why no process which splits water will ever generate more energy than it consumes.

I mean, the process works with splitting the atom. It doesn't require a nuclear bomb worth of energy to split an atom...splitting an atom leaves a whole lot of excess energy.

Yes, but when you split an atom you're actually destroying that atom. Once the process is complete you don't have the same atom you started with - instead the atom is gone, and you have a surplus of energy.

And for the other type of nuclear reaction - fusion - you actually fuse two hydrogen atoms into one helium atom, so you end up with a different form of matter than what you started with. THAT is where the energy comes from.

See the difference?

Re:Screw water

[Bandman (86149)]

Energy and matter are interchangeable, but they've still got to equal out.

If you wound up with less water than what you started with, and you claimed to be splitting hydrogen and oxygen, then you'd have a basis in reality, but 2H20 -> 2H2O + energy doesn't add up

Re:Screw water

[Dun Malg (230075)]

Doesn't it depend on how much energy is stored in the Hydrogen and Oxygen atoms? Is it more than the energy required to split the molecule? If I remember correctly, normally the answer is no, but adding the right catalyst can change that.

No, the answer is always no. It might help you to think of it as analogous to kinetic energy. The amount of energy you can harvest from a weight falling one meter will never be more than the amount of energy required to lift an equal weight up one meter. Like a see-saw, it'll balance and remain static until either the end height of weight 2 is reduced by moving the fulcrum, or weight 1 is made heavier or weight 2 is made lighter. This is the basic reason why perpetual motion machines don't work. Chemistry is no different. You can't get more out than you put in. A catalyst can only "grease the wheels" of the reaction, reducing the amount of excess energy needed to start the reaction.

the process works with splitting the atom...splitting an atom leaves a whole lot of excess energy.

Fission reactions have nothing to do with chemistry. Fission power takes advantage of nuclear physics. Chemistry is like reconfiguring lego blocks into different arrays, while fission is like smashing the blocks with a hammer.

Running cars on water?

[Gordonjcp (186804)]

I used to use about a gallon of water per tank of petrol to get 40mpg out of my '82 Volvo 340, with the engine running quieter and more smoothly, and better low-end torque. Water is great, you've just got to put in the engine the right way. If modern cars used water injection, they wouldn't need catalytic converters.

Re:Running cars on water?

[jamie (78724)]

Also, if you pour dirt into the radiator, it cleans your hoses with the power of mud.

Re:Running cars on water?

[rubycodez (864176)]

water inject is used in some aircraft engines that are designed for it, as a way to run leaner mixture. It can help some automobile engines a little, but people claiming huge 30% or 40% efficiency increases in car are just b.s.ing themselves and probably don't even know how to consistently compute miles per gallons (in short, idiots)

Re:Running cars on water?

[evilviper (135110)]

This is 100% BS. Please cite a single reputable study or article that demonstrates you can increase mileage by adding water to gasoline.

No, actually it's NOT (entirely) BS. Water injection is a well-known technique which does improve fuel efficiency.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_injection_(engines) [wikipedia.org]

Don't you think that if it did work, more people would do it, and it would be built into modern cars?

Now THIS is BS. There are innumerable reasons a technology, which can improve fuel efficiency in modern vehicles, might not be used. Things like weight, maintenance, reliability, etc.

The fact that superchargers aren't used in mass-produced automobiles is evidence enough of that. Higher compression ratios and water injection would be a welcome improvement.

haiku

[by Anonymous Coward]

water runs your car
rain, tea, and cool gentle mists
maybe piss does too

Re:haiku

[ScrewMaster (602015)]

maybe piss does too

Yes, but only if you are using a reciprocating internal combustion engine that has pisstons.

Re:haiku

[Hatta (162192)]

Are those R Kelly lyrics?

Re:haiku

[sconeu (64226)]

Lisa, in this house
We obey the Three Laws of
Thermodynamics

---

Cap'n, I canna
Break the laws o' physics
But Genepax can

uunnngh

[Profane MuthaFucka (574406)]

Profane Muthafucka
Would purchase a water car
And fuel it with sperm.

Haiku

[by Anonymous Coward]

Garden hose pressure
Spins turbine blades to release
BS upon world

This car has no trouble running on water...

[SamP2 (1097897)]

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2239/1801128557_043a923ea2.jpg [flickr.com]

Summer

[Robaato (958471)]

Rainy season comes
bringing with it a fresh crop
of nutball scammers

Deep thoughts.....

[RatPh!nk (216977)]

car runs on water

being fooled is never fun

want to buy a bridge?

Haiku

[Weaselmancer (533834)]

Homer Simpson says
In this house we all obey
Thermodynamics

Water car haiku

[cunamara (937584)]

Car running on water
driving in a desert.
Which way do you go?

How it works

[camperdave (969942)]

The key to that system, it seems, is its membrane electrode assembly (or MEA), which contains a material that's capable of breaking down water into hydrogen and oxygen through a chemical reaction.http://www.engadget.com/2008/06/13/genepax-shows-off-water-powered-fuel-cell-vehicle/ [engadget.com]

So water may not be the only thing fueling this car. They use a chemical reaction to crack the water, and then use the hydrogen from the water and oxygen from the air to run a fuel cell. The real questions are: What is in these membranes? How long do they last? What does it cost to renew the membranes?

Re:How it works

[Nethemas the Great (909900)]

What is in these membranes? How long do they last? What does it cost to renew the membranes?

It may be related to a 2005 discovery [sciam.com] published in the Scientfic American [sciam.com] that combine organosilanes [wikipedia.org] with water in the presence of a rhenium [wikipedia.org] based catalyst to produce hydrogen.

Re:How it works

[Nethemas the Great (909900)]

I found a better "TFA" [nikkeibp.co.jp] than a lame Reuters vid. There's actually a few more details about the system.

Haiku

[Tabernaque86 (1046808)]

Haikus are easy,
but sometimes they don't make sense.
Refridgerator.

You don't even need water!

[Ecuador (740021)]

If I understand correctly, this car claims to burn hydrogen to power itself. So, since burning hydrogen = producing water, you can just take the water from the exhaust and put it back in the little thingy that separates hydrogen. So, they were being modest, you don't even need to add water (or tea)!

Seriously now, I see serious posts here about things that "we don't know / don't yet comprehend" like "zero point energy" etc. Guys, perhaps if you take a couple of physics courses you will both "know" and "comprehend" and in addition you will be able to discern obvious scams.

Unless they are using a nice tiny fusion generator here. In that case when you pour water, it would be taking the deuterium out of it. Then I imagine they will tell you to throw in some old lithium batteries you have lying around, so that tritium can be generated. So, with your deuterium-tritium fuel you can power up Mr Fusion and have all the power you need!

Seriously people...

Poor education -- haiku

[istartedi (132515)]

Poor education
Drool from your lips runs the car
Reporters buy it

Some links ...

[flnca (1022891)]

... because there are none in TFA:

WES system [google.com] (Google-translated)

Genepax homepage [genepax.co.jp] (English)

Tea?

[stranger_to_himself (1132241)]

.."long as you have a bottle of water inside" to pour into the fuel tank ("even tea," repeats this report)..

With what we're currently paying for bottled water, I think you'd be better off sticking with gas.

Nooklear Wessels

[hpa (7948)]

Okay, this is starting to piss me off, because I have now seen posts on Slashdot that gets this elementary thing wrong both ways...

There is exactly one way by which you can make hydrogen extraction from water a net power gain: if the hydrogen extracted is used for nuclear fusion. Assuming any remotely efficient fusion (i.e. worth bothering with), the energy gain from fusion should vastly exceed the cost of splicing water, separating out deuterium, etc. For combustion in oxygen, no... water is already the ash of that process.

You could theoretically burn hydrogen in a fluorine atmosphere and get more energy out, but that assumes a ready supply of elemental fluorine (doesn't exist) and something to do with the hydrogen fluoride that results (HF will corrode glass.)

Haiku? I'll give it a shot.

[jcr (53032)]

Fools and their money
Parted by free energy
while wiser men laugh

-jcr

Re:Whats the problem....

[by Anonymous Coward]

Yeah and my boat runs on water.

Re:Whats the problem....

[toriver (11308)]

Since one Jesus walked on water you probably need two or three Jesuses to run on it.

Re:Hmm

[jmorris42 (1458)]

> It's one thing to claim that their car doesn't work, it's another
> to claim it doesn't work because what it proposes to do is impossible.

Conservation of Energy says that what they are claiming is impossible. Water simply cannot be the fuel source for a hydrogen fueled energy source. When you burn (i.e. oxidize) hydrogen you get water as the result. Since no machine yet devised by man is 100% efficient the machine can't even sit and spin, to say nothing of produce enough excess energy to move a vehicle.

What they are claiming is more fantastic than a perpetual motion machine and the Patent Office stopped bothering to examine perpetual motion applications decades ago. Used to be every generation of half educated 'scientists' would learn just enough about magnets to get convinced there just 'had' to be an arrangement of them that would create perpetual motion, totally ignoring conservation of energy. Now the fetish seems to be moving to the water -> hydrogen + oxygen -> water cycle.

Now the claims of some in this thread that they are actually getting the energy from an Aluminum + water -> hydrogen + ? reaction is possible, but that isn't what they are claiming. And if they did it would be an Aluminum powered vehicle and we would be asking how many miles per pound it gets.

Re:Mines better!

[fishdan (569872)]

H2O powers cars
Pigs fly out of my buttocks
Your check is in mail.

A limerick

[Bloater (12932)]

There once was a car from Japan
that seemed like a zero-point scam.
Then slashdot derived
that the H2O drive
got more energy out than you can.

Re:Open your minds, please.

[Cyberax (705495)]

Well, there's a small problem - all fusion reactors emit neutrons and x-rays. It should be (barely) possible to shield x-rays without making your car to be the size of a small tank. However, there's no way to effectively shield from neutrons (even submerging the reactor in a tank of boronated water won't help much).

So let's calculate how fast you'll receive a fatal dose of radiation. Let's assume the fatal dose to be 10 grays - that's 1000 joules of whole-body absorbed energy for 100kg of body weight.

Even aneutronic boron-proton fusion produces 0.1% energy in form of neutrons. Let's assume that 1% of these neutrons reaches you.

So you'll absorb 0.01% of engine's power in form of penetrating radiation. Let's assume that engine's power is 100hp, that's 75kWt in SI. So the neutron flux through your body will be about 7.5 Watts.

So you'll get the fatal dose in about 2 minutes.

Have a nice ride!