It's pretty clear to Me that They gave Us wrong science to hide the energy in the aether.  The laws of thermodynamics hold, because the energy in the aether is not created not destroyed, but can be drawn on.

Why would They want to hide that energy?  I think I have said before:

Free energy means no point to accounting for Our energy added into a system - the foundational function of all "money" in any form.  And money is Their single tool to buy the things and the People to Their agendas.

Without the need for money, They have just as much power as You or Me.

And surely They do not want to lose Their tool to control, so...  They feed Us bogus science and theories, with ad hoc elements to make them work ("dark matter," "dark energy," "bending of spacetime").  But there are theories - at least one... - that need nothing ad hoc.

And that would be the late Dr. Paul A. LaViolette's subquantum kinetics (SQK).  It predicts the energy in the aether, and exactly what My father and TT Brown were getting with electrogravitics (pulled into black projects).
 
SQK:  https://starburstfound.org/category/research/subquantum-kinetics/