Daniel H Dingel
Daniel H. Dingel | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | January 19, 1928 San Fernando, La Union, Philippines |
| Died | October 18, 2010 (aged 82) Las Piñas, Metro Manila, Philippines |
| Residence | Philippines |
| Nationality | Filipino |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Engineer, Inventor |
Daniel H. Dingel (January 19, 1928 – October 18, 2010) was a Filipino inventor best known for his long-standing claim to have developed a water-fuelled engine capable of powering an automobile using water in place of gasoline. His claims were widely publicized in the Philippines but were never independently verified and are regarded as disputed and outside mainstream science.
Biography
Dingel was born on January 19, 1928, in San Fernando, La Union, in the Philippines, and later resided in the Manila area. He worked as an engineer and inventor and spent much of his career promoting his water-powered car concept. He died on October 18, 2010, in Las Piñas, Metro Manila, at the age of 82.
Work
Dingel stated that he began developing a "hydrogen reactor" in 1969 and reported using the device to power an automobile, which he identified as a 1996 Toyota Corolla. According to Dingel, the device split hydrogen from water stored in an onboard tank and burned the resulting gas, producing no carbon emissions. He publicized the invention over several decades and demonstrated cars he said ran on water, but he never disclosed the internal workings of the device.
Claims
Dingel's assertions that plain water could serve as a vehicle's sole fuel are inconsistent with the accepted principles of thermodynamics, which hold that recovering usable energy from the electrolysis and recombination of water cannot yield a net energy gain. His invention was never verified under independent testing, and the Philippine Department of Science and Technology characterized it as a hoax. Within mainstream engineering, water-fuelled car claims of this kind are generally categorized alongside perpetual-motion proposals, and Dingel's work remains disputed.
In November 2000, Dingel entered into a business arrangement with representatives of the Formosa Plastics Group, receiving funds intended for research, development, and prototype vehicles. In December 2008, a Philippine court found Dingel guilty of estafa (fraud) for failing to deliver the promised technology and sentenced him, then aged 82, to a maximum of 20 years' imprisonment, along with an order to pay damages.