Water as Fuel?

**slick4591**[$] · #1 05-23-2006, 10:12 AM

This video shows we're not that far away.

http://www.wimp.com/fuelwater/

**mtomm**[$] · #2 05-23-2006, 10:46 AM

I can't see this at work but is this the video from Fox News? If so, it just seems too good to be true.

**slick4591**[$] · #3 05-23-2006, 10:52 AM

It is from Fox.

**mtomm**[$] · #4 05-23-2006, 12:00 PM

I wish I understood how it works. Somebody explain in plain English.

Stokes Pennwalt · #5 05-23-2006, 01:21 PM

If I am right in my interpretation (and I can't think of an alternative) then this isn't BS, but it isn't the panacea it is made out to be in the misleading video. He is performing the age-old process of electrolysis, which uses electricity to break the covalent bonds of a water molecule and rip the positively-charged hydrogen atoms away from the negatively-charged oxygen. The two gases are stored seperately, and then recombined and burned again. This results in them recombining into water (thus the droplets from the torch flame) and some of the energy used in electrolysis being recouped as heat energy from combustion.

Electrolysis requires LOTS of energy in the form of electricity, and the energy liberated when the 2-H2 and 1-O2 are combusted and recombine is much less than what is initially put into seperating them. The second law of thermodynamics tells us that you can't get more energy out of a reversible process than you put into it. So from that we can conclude that this is a form of energy currency, in that you might have a generator in your home that would electrolysize water into gases that would be pumped into your car and stored there under pressure, possibly cryogenically. This is rather than an energy source, like oil or coal or uranium, which exists naturally and produces energy when consumed (more than it takes to consume it in any case). Any internal combustion engine could burn these gases and make power without much modification. However the electrolysis process would require vastly more energy than the car would get out of the fuel (even if its engine were 100% efficient, which piston engines are far from) so your electric bill would be ridiculous.

Electrolysis (of natural gas - CH4, or LP - C2H6) is considered a solid candidate for home hydrogen generation once electric cars with hydrogen fuel cells are viable for consumer use, but burning hydrogen in a piston engine is incredibly inefficient. At the end of the day, all you're doing is removing the load from the gasoline infrastructure and putting a much bigger load (due to inherent inefficiencies of conversion) on the electrical utility grid, which is already experiencing stress and expansion problems of its own.

The part about the torch flame being cool until contact is confusing, but it may be something to do with the way the gases are mixing, I don't know. Also, "HHO gas" is impossible - hydrogen and oxygen are diatomic molecules (H2 and O2) in nature, and when mixed, water is the lowest energy state for them. That could be an arbitrary trademark or something though.

**drmomentum**[$] · #6 05-23-2006, 01:56 PM

I'm with Stokes - the video is confusing in many aspects. But electrolysis is real.

I have a hydrogen-powered rocket that runs on hydrogen pulled from water.

**mtomm**[$] · #7 05-23-2006, 02:09 PM

Every woman knows what electrolysis is but I have feeling we are not talking about hair removal here.

Stokes, I appreciated your explanation, still a lot over my head but at least it points out the "catch" to this techonology. That it takes more energy to produce it than what you gain from it. Right?

**drmomentum**[$] · #8 05-23-2006, 03:25 PM

It takes significant electricity to separate the hydrogen atom from the two oxygen atoms.

-JP

Toonmaster · #9 05-23-2006, 06:00 PM

I am a plumber and heating Engineer and know for a fact that hydrogen powered boilers, furnaces are already in production in germany.These use some kind of hydrogen reactor that once started lasts for 25 years.these boilers can supposedly produce heat for your water, and electricity.As the reactor cant be switched off, when not in use the eletricity will be sent back out for everyone to use....

Stokes Pennwalt · #10 05-23-2006, 08:37 PM

Quote:

mtomm said

Stokes, I appreciated your explanation, still a lot over my head but at least it points out the "catch" to this techonology. That it takes more energy to produce it than what you gain from it. Right?

Yeah, that is the gist of it. The phrase most people use is "energy-negative".

Hydrogen may always be an energy-negative currency, but that isn't necessarily a bad thing. It takes lots of electricity to produce it, but when we have ways of producing all the electricity we could ever need (atoms!) then it won't matter if hydrogen fueled vehicles are 5% as efficient as gasoline fueled vehicles because the overwhelming abundance of electricity will make hydrogen production cheap enough to compensate.

**slick4591**[$] · #11 05-23-2006, 09:03 PM

Thanks for the enlightenment, Stokes.