A new execution method could potentially soon be used for the first time in the US : nitrogenhypoxia . While its proponents argue it is a humane and effective means of capital punishment , its critics say there ’s merely not enough evidence to justify its use .

Nitrogen hypoxia involves forcing a person to breathe pure nitrogen flatulence , starving them of oxygen until they die . Although the exact protocols have not yet been draw up , there is some thought of what they might implicate :

“ The communications protocol would likely involve placing some character of masquerade party over the objurgate inmate ’s head and pump it full of 100 percent nitrogen , thereby deprive that person of oxygen . The inmate would go not by suffocation , which is due to an inability to exhale and a subsequent ( and very awful ) buildup of carbon dioxide in the dead body , but rather by becoming gradually atomic number 8 - deprive , which is essentially painless , ” according toThe Marshall Project , a criminal Justice Department NGO .

Just three US states have authorized the use of atomic number 7 hypoxia as an execution method acting – Alabama , Oklahoma , and Mississippi – but no state of matter has performed an execution using it , according to theDeath Penalty Information Centre .

That could before long change , however .

The experimental execution method has recently made the news because of the unusual case of Kenneth Eugene Smith , an Alabama yardbird who was condemn to death for a 1988 murder - for - hire . Together with confederate John Parker , Smith was charter to kill Elizabeth Dorlene Sennett by her married man so he could compile her life policy .

Smith was plant to die in November 2022 , buthe survivedafter prison authorities could n’t find an intravenous line for the lethal shot drugs before the state ’s execution guarantee run out at midnight .

After Smith get ahead his cause at the lower motor inn level , Alabama officials appealed to the US Supreme Court ( SCOTUS ) . However , on Monday , May 15,the SCOTUS allowedSmith ’s challenge to proceed .

Despite Smith ’s desire to invite this method acting of death penalty , experts have previously expressed concern that the method has n’t undergo enough testing and enquiry .

“ There is a claim , that I remember is baseless , that atomic number 7 gas inspiration would cause a death that would be peaceful and not cruel . There ’s no evidence for any of that , ” Joel Zivot , an associate professor of anesthesiology at Emory University , toldScientific Americanin 2022 .

Research on nitrogen hypoxiain non - human mammalshas led veterinary and animal wellness regulators to conclude that the method is insufferable for euthanizing animate being . Some study have shown that dogs take up to five moment to die despite losing consciousness within one to two . For large - bodied humans , it could take even longer .

erstwhile studies , however , have found the opposite , concluding that nitrogen hypoxia is " in force , humanist , safe , and economically executable as a method acting of euthanasia . "

Some also debate that it is notably more humanistic than lethal injection , which has been linked to anumber of screw up execution .

“ It ’s a painless way of life to go . But more clip needs to be spent [ study ] that , " Louisiana Department of Corrections Secretary James LeBlanctoldthe state legislative committee in April 2014 .

In total , there ’s not enough evidence to make an informed discernment either way . It ’s even unreadable how this could be ethically tested and evaluate how humane this method of die is .

Despite these many ethical and practical questions , the US may become the first country in the reality to formally use N in an executing sleeping accommodation if these effectual legal proceeding proceed to drive the way they are going .