Quote:
Originally Posted by T-Keith
Are you kidding me? I've ignored the constant stream of pipe dream "alternative fuels" that for some reason make the front page of this site, but this is ridiculous. Turning one substance into another and then turning it back will always give you a negative return unless there is another source of energy.
This is perpetual motion guys, remember 5th grade science? This board was already headed downhill with the environmental cooks, but this is just dumb.
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Yeah, I was thinking the same thing. Put another way, fuel cells work by extracting the energy created as the hydrogen molecules bond to oxygen. If the system is also doing the reverse, it must use an equivalent amount of energy, thereby negating any output. And due to inefficiencies such as heat, friction, etc. it would actually use more electricity than it puts out.
The only possibility is that a catalyst or reactant of some sort is used to separate the hydrogen and oxygen components of water in the first place. If there were a substance, such as pure aluminum bonding to the oxygen to form aluminum-oxide, then hydrogen would be released. However, this would then require the external processing and input of a stabilized aluminum, so the potential energy or power, would then be stored there rather than water, per se. That's just an example though, if any number of external substances or catalysts are used for a reaction with water, then that is really the focus--which the article handily avoids.