There's something called the "Dirt Pile Swindle" of yesteryear where swindlers would convince investors that they found a gold mine chock full of gold. They would use investors' money to buy equipment but mostly pay themselves handsomely. In the end they would report to investors that it just didn't pan out despite their best efforts and off they would go with their pockets lined with cash.

At what point is that a swindle??...when they represented that there was value in their operation when they had no reasonable basis for believe it to be true. Sure, for all the swindlers knew, maybe they would start digging and they would strike a lode. But did they have a rational basis or did they make that up??

You can decide whether or not Mr. Bordynuik had any reasonable basis for saying that he could make fuel for under $10/bbl for which refineries had offered him WTI-$3...or even whether he had any reasonable basis for saying his secret catalyst made the process of pyrolysis any more valuable.

For the dirt pile swindle, sure it's possible that the person running it had good intentions and was merely a quixotic idiot who really believed that there was gold in the area because he saw the end of a rainbow over the area...but then why didn't that person share his 'evidence' with his investors so they could better evaluate whether he was rational or just plain dumb?? Why would he hide any of his perceived evidence of value??