Are revolutionary inventions being suppressed because they provide energy independence?

Hydrogen is a known game-changer for the future of renewable, clean energy – but is the concept of energy independence part of the reason why some revolutionary inventions are being suppressed?

We recently published an article on “The Hydrogen Revolution”, which explored the benefits of hydrogen vehicles over electric vehicles. During the research conducted for that article we came across an unknown inventor with a revolutionary approach to producing hydrogen, which could be a global game changer. This inventor has specifically requested that he remain anonymous and provided some rather bizarre reasoning for this, connected to his security.

Hydrogen fuel is made using a process called electrolysis. In short, water consists of two hydrogen molecules and one oxygen molecule, hence the being referred to as “H₂O”, which are separated by using the electrolysis process that requires a large amount of electricity.

There is, however, another known and simple method for separating the two hydrogen atoms from the oxygen atom in water, which is a chemical separation process. If you add water to a fine aluminium powder, it absorbs the oxygen and leaves a pure hydrogen gas. These two elements are principally why this process is seen as unsafe, because hydrogen gas is volatile and aluminium powder is used in making explosives. If you put these two things together in the vicinity of a vehicle engine, where sparks are a common and sometimes critical part of operation, it becomes clear why this approach is not seen as too dangerous.

However, if you add a small amount of sodium hydroxide to the water, which is commonly referred to as lye, instead of a fine aluminium powder, you could instead use tin foil or cut up fizzy drinks cans as the source of aluminium. This eliminates one of the two dangerous elements, but the potential for a chain reaction with hydrogen gas still exists and would not be able to pass stringent safety tests for large scale production of road vehicles.

This challenge is widely considered by scientists and experts as insurmountable and why producing hydrogen gas for transport use through the chemical separation is not considered viable.

When advanced science and conspiracy theories collide

Now back to our anonymous inventor. Our interview with this gentleman was a cross between an advanced science lesson and a bizarre conspiracy theory, with dark stories of tampering with ingredients delivered that caused explosions, to investor funding being mysteriously pulled at the last minute for no apparent reason. For one minute let us set aside the conspiracy theory sounding elements and focus on the science.

The inventor claims to have literally stumbled across a method of controlling a seemingly uncontrollable chemical reaction. By simply using a pressure control valve the wrong way, his production method not only works, but produces such small amounts of “on demand” pure hydrogen gas, that if an explosion did occur, it would go unnoticed. To explain, the invention is what could be considered as the world’s first portable, on demand hydrogen gas production unit, which has been made possible by effectively and inadvertently using an inverted gas pressure value that simultaneously controls the production of hydrogen gas and acting as a micro storage device for the gas produced gas.

The best way of describing the portable production unit is that it looks like a deep fat fryer, both in size and material composition. It’s made from a high-density polyethylene (HDPE) and consists of a containment vessel and a lid. The containment vessel is filled with water and lye and the lid contains a tray with a wire mesh bottom in which the aluminium is placed. A small pump powered by a battery pumps the water and lye from the bottom chamber and drips it onto the aluminium.

Creating pure hydrogen gas

This process creates a pure hydrogen gas and the inadvertently inverted back pressure gas valve acts as a mini storage device, which when filled with a small amount of gas, also acts as a cut off valve to the water pump that prevents the dangerous prospect of a spiralling chemical chain reaction. This gas can then be used in a number of ways as a vehicle fuel.

The two most tested and proven ways are using a simple T-connector into the fuel line of a vehicle. In a standard petrol or diesel vehicle the portable unit is placed in the boot and the engine simply uses a combination of the standard fuel mixed with a small amount of hydrogen gas. This simultaneously reduces emissions and fuel consumption because hydrogen gas is a clean source of energy.

The second method is using hydrogen gas as the primary and sole source of vehicle fuel, but it will only work in vehicles modified to use Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG). LPG vehicles are quite common nowadays and many people have converted their vehicles because of the improved mileage, lower fuel costs and reduced emissions.  The third method is what should be considered a truly revolutionary approach and relates directly the debate between hydrogen and electric vehicles in our previous article.

Downsides of electric vehicles?

One of the biggest downsides to electric vehicles identified in the article is their batteries. Apart from being very heavy and very expensive, their production has some very dark links to child exploitation. What if an electric vehicle could replace its battery with a thermoelectric generator (TEGs)? TEGs are very small, very light and comparatively speaking, very, very inexpensive.

One of the biggest downsides to hydrogen vehicles, highlighted in the article, is the huge task of making liquid hydrogen available at all petrol stations and ramping up production capacity to meet demand. What if this need for a huge infrastructure and production increase could be replaced with small scale, individual hydrogen production on demand?

This invention would actually fuse two very promising types of environmentally friendly transport whilst eliminating all the downsides and this is not just a wild theory. According to the inventor and as previously mentioned, investor funds were mysteriously withdrawn at the last minute without explanation. Again, in the interests of protecting the identity of the parties involved the investors were a Canadian based investment organisation, which owns a controlling stake in an electric car manufacturing company. They had approved over 100 million dollars in investment and even arranged a CNN film crew to cover a test. The test was along the lines of the old Energizer Bunny TV commercials, where a petrol car, electric car and a hydrogen / TEG  / electric hybrid car would all start at the same point along a 1,000 mile long route from Northern California to Canada with no petrol stations or recharging points and the film crew would record where each vehicle ran out of fuel.

The electric car would drop out first; followed by the petrol car, but the hydrogen fuelled TEG would power the other electric car for the full 1,000 miles. The portable hydrogen generator would then be refilled with water and would then travel back along the 1,000 mile route, passing the two broken down vehicles on its way.

Think of what was being put on display for a moment and ask, why would it be stopped in its tracks? This vehicle would have a 1,000 mile range and be run on water and tin foil rather than petrol or electricity and run with zero emissions. This would effectively kill the market for petrol cars, electric cars and hydrogen cars.

It would also kill investment in infrastructure for electric vehicle charging points, large scale hydrogen production and all the subsidies that go along with these emerging technologies. So ask yourself two simple questions – Is this technology being suppressed? And, why is the inventor of this revolutionary technology seemingly terrified of going public?