Questions raised about corruption of 'Big Oil'

If you think that the recent $4 per gallon spike in the price of gasoline is a racket, you’re right. But you just grouse about it and pay it anyway because you have no other choice.

Even worse is the stifling of technology that could give us highly efficient automobiles. In the late 1930s, a Shell Oil laboratory developed engines that gave mileages of about a 1,000 miles per gallon. Several years later, a lad in his garage tinkered with his Buick Roadmaster (about the same weight as a Humvee) and drove the car 200 miles on two gallons of gas. After Shell Oil managed to con him out of his patents, the lad was found dead. Later, another backyard inventor came up with a similar engine, but he was intimidated into scrapping the whole idea.

In all of those cases, the carburetors were modified to have water vapor injected into the fuel-air mix. Using lower octane fuel, the engines were able to deliver greater power or mileage while emitting minimal pollutants.

A CD video titled “Gashole” tells about these rip-offs and is available.

The big question here is “Why can’t we get our patent laws changed to cancel any patent that is not used for the public benefit within a reasonable period of time.

Talk to your congresspeople.

JOSEPH HENRY WYTHE

Sandpoint