snake oil (dictionary.com)
noun
1. any of various liquid concoctions of questionable medical value sold as an all-purpose curative,especially by traveling hucksters.
2. Slang. deceptive talk or actions; hooey; bunkum.
From commuters puttering to work on miserly two-wheelers, to those who splurge on the latest imported four-wheeled status symbol, albeit a diesel version and the industrial sector for whom it comprises a major recurring expenditure, high prices of Fuel are a painful reality for all. However, whenever a technology that promises to save a few litres of the all-precious fluid is announced, it is instantly relegated to the category of Snake Oil Salesmen, in which none but the most gullible would believe in or actually spend any money on.
But do they work?
The only question ever uttered about any of these wonder devices, additives or technologies is invariably “does it work?” Unfortunately, there is no single universal answer, as the field is varied, comprising of gadgets of all shapes, sizes and operating principles, liquids of different characteristics and backed-up by theories ranging from sometimes sensible to outright bizarre. Nonetheless, over the years, a trickle of feedback from both the public and the industries as well as several unbiased studies found that many of these do work, some albeit erratically and others very well. So despite the smirking hosts of TV science shows, the opinionated professor who is also the local Skeptic Society’s chairman and sole member, or the general notion “if it works why isn’t everyone using them,” the field of Fuel Saving Technologies, which is almost as old IC engines, simply refuses to die out.
Governments on their part, despite giving loud lip service to the need of fuel economy, do very little to actually support the cause due to a conflict of interest, as oil revenues and taxes are a major source of income. The vanguard of all hydrocarbon burning technologies in the US the EPA(Environmental Protection Agency) is chronically myopic towards any Fuel saving device or technology and usually does a very good job in discrediting the inventors. Meanwhile the few times our Indian government or a reputed institution was in the news because of this subject, it was usually for all the wrong reasons. A classic example is that of one Rammar Pillai who in 1996 declared that he had concocted a herbal petrol, a claim check and endorsed by a number of IIT scientists, the Department of Science and Technology and countless political figures, but who gets arrested four years later by the CBI in a murky case for selling a noxious inflammable chemical soup sans any herbs as his wonder fuel.
Some do, others in fact very well.
The ever-climbing prices of Petrol and Diesel worldwide have resulted in a renewed interest in fuel saving and a slew of new, old and even archaic technologies are now being shared around the world thanks to various Internet forms dedicated to the subject. Technologies such as HHO, essentially a highly efficient electrolyzer that splits water into Hydrogen and oxygen are almost becoming a mainstream retrofit on cars, to the extent that even Police departments in several US counties are fitting them in their cars.
Now, take for example the most dis-believable gadget of them all: the Magnetic Fuel saver. Consisting of a tiny magnet attached to the fuel line of a car or a two-wheeler often sold by fly-by-night dealers with the most extravagant of claims. But interestingly, only recently it has officially surfaced that Russian, Chinese and many now South American Oil companies have been successfully using magnets to reduce wax build-up in their sub-sea pipelines. In the process proving that magnetic fields have a perceptible effect on the viscosity and flow characteristics of liquid hydrocarbons, thus demonstrating that if such magnetic devices are made with due scientific research and laboratory tests, there is a strong possibility they could indeed improve the atomization of liquid fuels and consequently decrease fuel intake.
On the other end of the spectrum is the complex field of Fuel Emulsification where hydrocarbons such as Heavy Fuel Oil or Diesel are infused with a small percentage of water in micron sized droplets to improve burning efficiency and save fuel anywhere in the range of 5% to 25%. The process can be accomplished by cavitation, ultrasound or mechanical means along with special additives to keep the resulting suspension from separating or coalescing into their individual mediums. Fuel emulsification has proved itself across the world with big names like Elftotalfina, Caterpillar, Komatsu and PDVSA jumping on the bandwagon. Surprisingly the the EPA of USA carried out extensive tests on emulsified fuels and released impressive results.
In India, the technology was endorsed by none other than the then President Mr. A.P.J Abdul Kalam who said, “Emulsified fuels are found to give much better emission reduction towards reduced particulate and Oxides of Nitrogen emission reduction along with fuel saving that it is now implemented in most of the developed countries.”
And yet the number of companies in the country or elsewhere adopting this technology for their oil fired furnaces, boilers or generators is still in single digits. The main reason being that the very idea of mixing oil with water is unpalatable for most, followed by misgivings that water would have a quenching effect on the flame or that the calorific value of the Fuel would be reduced. In fact the EPA study on the subject revealed that an emulsion with 15% water actually has about 25% more caloric value than the base fuel of the same volume.
Not Snake Oil, but Lousy Salesmen all the same..!!
Despite the universal moniker of being Snake Oil Salesmen, deluded individuals or both, in real life most Fuel Saving Technology providers are just inexperienced or very naive businessmen and despite having the odd conman in their midst, the majority never started off with the objective of cheating anyone. As a rule most of them are startups consisting of a small team with limited finances due to which their inventions despite giving positive results in controlled environments, hardly ever get extensively tested under real world working conditions before being released commercially. Consequently many of the products are crude, at best give intermittent results, with operating principles poorly understood by their creators themselves.
Having little prior business experience they get quickly bogged down trying to market a “possibly-working” but definitely little understood concept and sooner or later almost all of them quickly zoom down an express elevator from starry-eyed ideology, through greed to cynicism before finally closing shop. In other instances, many spent half their lifetime inventing and perfecting their Fuel saver and sadly spend the other half trying to convince the world that it works at the same time paranoid that their ideas would be stolen or that they would fall prey to the shadowy strong-arm of the Oil lobby.
Many also fall prey to dubious business practices by taking advances from clients or security deposits from dealer and later fall on the wrong side of the law for either failing to deliver or producing a substandard product that does not live up to the claims. Paul Pantone, the U.S. inventor of the infamous GEET, who spent a decade fighting legal suits and a stint in the psychiatric hospital is the perfect example of a discredited inventor. This however didn't stop the French from embracing his concepts and developing them further. Known there as the Giller-Pantone system, this unique water-fuel doping system it has been replicated thousands of times and at least two companies are manufacturing fully accredited fuel saving gadgets based on his principles.
We are big, you are nobody.
If a fuel saving device or additive sold in the automotive markets still manages to generate some sales, the Industrial Fuel Saving Technology specialists (we would call them iFSTs) have it far worse.
The first setback in the implementation of a Fuel saving technology comes in the guise of prospective clients who even after seeing a certain technology proving successful in one or two installations, have no qualms in audaciously demanding the works for free or on near impossible terms. They rationalize their argument as “they are offering a chance in a lifetime” and assure of a landslide of future business opportunities if proven a success with them, or simply that they are indulging in an expensive gamble by trying out an untested new technology. At times it is the client’s employees safeguarding their jobs and adopt a position with the reasoning that “if it works I win and if it doesn’t its at the vendors cost.” But with many companies it is almost an unspoken rule to exploit small vendors to the maximum.
The representatives of an Indian origin non-ferrous metal giant has set a record of sorts in wasting time of nearly every specialist of this field in the country by repeatedly asking for information, demands that they visits their various plants(obviously at their own cost) and later invariably bury any potential deal under an avalanche of impossible terms and conditions from heavy discounts on pricing to unrealistic payment schedules, and demands of various bank and performance guarantees, which no supplier would ever agree to provide or be able to satisfy.
Begrudging employees and rampant pilferage..
Even an industry decides to implement a iFST, it is hardly ever smooth sailing, because contrary to their expectations of a “fit, forget and get magical fuel savings” system, the new additions requires regular maintenance, a strict handling and consumption measuring methods. Furthermore, instead of recruiting a new person for the job, generally someone from the existing staff is given the additional charge and invariably the new workload is met with a sense of grudge and profound skepticism.
Likewise, very few industries have an independent energy-monitoring department and the area falls under the purview of the production department that by its very nature is biased towards maintaining and increasing productivity levels and not saving fuel. Consequently, fuel usage readings are frequently skewed and physical stock levels hardly ever tally with the figures in the books.
Pilferage of fuel in its various avatars is another all pervading phenomena and typically comprise a long chain of participants right from the supplier to the transporter and frequently many a company’s own staff, right from the security and stores clerks right up to production, purchase managers and even to the occasional director. And as any Fuel handling or management systems automatically makes transparent all anomalies and reveals the actual stock and consumption figures, it is invariably sabotaged and the technology quickly declared a dud.
The Fall Guy
In the recent years, a number of steel rolling mills in India signed up for a UNDP-GEF and Indian Ministry of Steels sponsored initiative for introducing energy efficient technologies into the sector. Others, had by their own accord installed Fuel saving devices in their plants, but within a few months virtually all gave up on their efforts as their production staff made the new equipment and practices , the scapegoats for all their own inefficiencies and shortfalls.
The best example of how an iFST is made the Fall Guy, is the case of a government owned oil refinary in Eastern India, which on the directive of the head office to implement Fuel Oil Emulsification decided to design their own Emulsifier on the basis of a schematic diagram found on the internet. As per their own admission, Rs.25 Lakhs(USD 47,000) was spent on cladding of Oil tanks and pipelines, and making a new pump house where two old pumps were pressed into service. The only missing component was the chemical additive to suspend the Fuel-water emulsion, for which a global tender valued at a princely sum of Rs. 50,000/-(USD 950) payable only after delivery and conducted tests was floated. The design of their so-called emulsifying unit was bereft of the slightest engineering common sense and was guaranteed not to work under any circumstances. Likewise none of the people involved in this farce had the slightest exposure to the field of emulsification or had ever bothered to contact any specialist in the field. Predictably their tests failed miserably, but they had the Fall Guy in place: the vendor of the Emulsifying additive!!
Yes, it works, but it doesn't!!
There are also many instances when an iFST work flawlessly with the results for all to see on paper, but where the industrial clients blatantly deny the facts. Sometimes its just shoddy calculations but mostly it is to hide the actual fuel consumption statistics as the same could be extrapolated into actual production figures by the various government revenue departments. Occasionally, it is to prevent the provider from going to their competition or simply the human ego that doesn’t want the guy in front look too good.
Rarely, motives are more sinister and a real life example is that of one Ghaziabad based Steel rolling mill. Having installed a Heavy Fuel Oil Emulsifier in their plant, they first tried to reverse-engineer the machine and consequently made changes that drastically reduced its effectiveness. Next came a torrent of complaints alleging that they were not getting any savings, but were proven baseless upon studying their production and fuel consumption records. Thereafter came blunt demands for the formulation of the chemical additive that was required for generating the Emulsion. When the vendor refused to bog down to their coercive demands the company unleashed a year-long campaign of pseudo-legal intimidations referring to a non-existent arbitration agreement and appointing their own foreman as the so-called Sole Arbitrator.
But, the Future
Comprising a motley group of brilliant scientist and experienced technocrats who are also lousy businessmen, starry eyed naïve idealists or battle hardened cynics, with the occasional charlatan in their midst, on first instances most fuel saving specialists don’t encourage much confidence either in their product, technology or ability.
Nevertheless, what also cannot be denied is that many of them are genuine experts in their field and know what they are doing and consistently deliver due results.
On the other hand is the Industry, which desperately needs Fuel saving measures, but is rife with malpractices and internal corruption and yet ceaselessly tries to exploit small startups for their own benefit by either making them work for free or by trying to intimidate them into revealing their secrets.
On the whole the future for iFSTs and their savants seems really bleak except for the fact that the prices of energy keep escalating and sooner or latter both the sides would have to settle in a mutually conducive professional environment. Where the genuine experts in Fuel savings or energy management gets their financial dues and not expected to run after carrots, made the fall guy or be intimidated in revealing all their secrets and where the Industry on their part starts focusing internally and makes an earnest effort in bringing about transparency in their ranks and operations.
Ravi Deka is an energy management consultant and a pioneer in introducing Fuel Emulsification concepts in the country.
