Swans on Tea

A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on. Churchill, inspired by Twain, pre-internet.

Genepax Unveils a Car That Runs on Water and Air

Try again, you sensationalizing hacks. Versions of this story have spread across the web like a bad rash.

Their new “Water Energy System (WES),” generates power by supplying water and air to the fuel and air electrodes using a proprietary technology called the Membrane Electrode Assembly (MEA). The secret behind MEA is a special material that is capable of breaking down water into hydrogen and oxygen through a chemical reaction.

If there’s a chemical reaction taking place, then it’s not running on water and air!

As said in the press release

The main feature of the new system is that it uses a membrane electrode assembly (MEA), which contains a material that breaks down the water to hydrogen and oxygen.

Got that? It contains a material that breaks down the water to hydrogen and oxygen. There’s a chemical reaction going on, for Odin’s sake! There are materials that like Oxygen even more than Hydrogen does. Introduce them, let them get acquainted, and they’ll get busy producing Hydrogen. But — and this is very important — the other material will eventually run out, and you’ll have to “refuel.”

To give an example, you can generate Hydrogen with water, Aluminum and Gadolinium (the latter is a catalyst which keeps the Al from forming an oxide layer, which would shut the reaction down, and the reaction is not exactly a “new process”). I don’t know if this is what’s going on here, but something sure is, because in this house we obey the laws of thermodynamics.

Update: good takedown over at Good Math, Bad Math