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river_styx Chaos Magnet.
Pain Joined: 08 Feb 2002 Total posts: 2146 Location: Between Here aaaaaaand....There. Age: 35 Gender: Male |
 Posted: 18-04-2009 13:09 Post subject: |
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So we have a new food source and a ready supply of pure oxygen.
Hydrogen is the saviour of us all! |
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| rynner2 What a Cad!
Great Old One Joined: 13 Dec 2008 Total posts: 21365 Location: Under the moon Gender: Male |
| Posted: 18-04-2009 13:48 Post subject: |
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| river_styx wrote: | | I'm just hung up on the thought that if we extract it from water then we're left with some excess oxygen... |
No problem - that oxygen is used again when we burn the hydrogen, or use it in a fuel cell, with the only exhaust product - water! |
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| river_styx Chaos Magnet.
Pain Joined: 08 Feb 2002 Total posts: 2146 Location: Between Here aaaaaaand....There. Age: 35 Gender: Male |
| Posted: 18-04-2009 18:12 Post subject: |
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| So we're burning the excess oxgen and that produces what as a by-product? |
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| rynner2 What a Cad!
Great Old One Joined: 13 Dec 2008 Total posts: 21365 Location: Under the moon Gender: Male |
| Posted: 18-04-2009 19:40 Post subject: |
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Hydrogen reacts with oxgen to give water. That's it, nothing else!
2H2 + O2 = 2H2O
Energy is used to split water into hydrogen and oxygen - when they recombine, we get the energy back. |
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| TheCavynaut Great Old One Joined: 08 Feb 2006 Total posts: 246 Location: Hull Gender: Male |
| Posted: 18-04-2009 19:48 Post subject: |
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So...you could even end up with electric cars with a plumbing system built in.  |
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| Mythopoeika Boring petty conservative
Joined: 18 Sep 2001 Total posts: 9109 Location: Not far from Bedford Gender: Unknown |
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| rynner2 What a Cad!
Great Old One Joined: 13 Dec 2008 Total posts: 21365 Location: Under the moon Gender: Male |
| Posted: 18-04-2009 22:57 Post subject: |
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Ah yes, how could I forget? 
It's been mentioned on this MB a few times, eg
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| TheCavynaut Great Old One Joined: 08 Feb 2006 Total posts: 246 Location: Hull Gender: Male |
| Posted: 18-04-2009 23:02 Post subject: |
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So, no point in patenting a car powered samovar then?  |
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| misterwibble Great Old One Joined: 05 Jan 2006 Total posts: 355 Location: Nearby Age: 21 Gender: Female |
| Posted: 19-04-2009 01:30 Post subject: |
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| rynner2 wrote: | Hydrogen reacts with oxgen to give water. That's it, nothing else!
2H2 + O2 = 2H2O
Energy is used to split water into hydrogen and oxygen - when they recombine, we get the energy back. |
Some of the energy back. Let's not forget no process is 100% energy efficient. |
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| rynner2 What a Cad!
Great Old One Joined: 13 Dec 2008 Total posts: 21365 Location: Under the moon Gender: Male |
| Posted: 19-04-2009 08:47 Post subject: |
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| misterwibble wrote: | | rynner2 wrote: | Hydrogen reacts with oxgen to give water. That's it, nothing else!
2H2 + O2 = 2H2O
Energy is used to split water into hydrogen and oxygen - when they recombine, we get the energy back. |
Some of the energy back. Let's not forget no process is 100% energy efficient. |
We get ALL of the energy back, but, depending on the process used, not all of this energy will be available as mechanical work - there will be some waste heat. (However, this is not the place for an essay on The Second Law of Thermodynamics!)
In case anyone feels inclined to worry about this 'waste heat' in times of global warming, fear not! If the energy used to dissociate water into oxygen and hydrogen comes from solar power, we are merely intercepting some of the sun's energy for our own convenience. The overall heating effect in the earth's atmosphere would be exactly the same, whether or not we use fuel cells or hydrogen burning for power.
Using fossil fuels is a different story, of course.... |
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| river_styx Chaos Magnet.
Pain Joined: 08 Feb 2002 Total posts: 2146 Location: Between Here aaaaaaand....There. Age: 35 Gender: Male |
| Posted: 19-04-2009 12:19 Post subject: |
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| Um, yeah, my consideration wasn't with water heat it was with the excess water itself. As I said before, if we're producing water that will be added into the water cycle and not initially taken from it then within a few years we're going to have the same problem with water as we're currently having with Co2. |
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| rynner2 What a Cad!
Great Old One Joined: 13 Dec 2008 Total posts: 21365 Location: Under the moon Gender: Male |
| Posted: 19-04-2009 12:36 Post subject: |
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| river_styx wrote: | | Um, yeah, my consideration wasn't with water heat it was with the excess water itself. As I said before, if we're producing water that will be added into the water cycle and not initially taken from it then within a few years we're going to have the same problem with water as we're currently having with Co2. |
NO!!!
Any hydrogen and oxygen used will have been derived from water in the first place. It's a completely closed cycle
water --> hydrogen and oxygen --> water
It's just a way of getting energy from the sun to somewhere where we can use it at our own convenience. |
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| river_styx Chaos Magnet.
Pain Joined: 08 Feb 2002 Total posts: 2146 Location: Between Here aaaaaaand....There. Age: 35 Gender: Male |
| Posted: 19-04-2009 12:45 Post subject: |
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| Fair enough, that's all I wanted to know. There wasn't really any need to be quite so patronising about it. |
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| rynner2 What a Cad!
Great Old One Joined: 13 Dec 2008 Total posts: 21365 Location: Under the moon Gender: Male |
| Posted: 19-04-2009 15:09 Post subject: |
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| river_styx wrote: | | Fair enough, that's all I wanted to know. There wasn't really any need to be quite so patronising about it. |
Sorry about that!
But I once was a teacher, and I know that kids sometimes ask daft questions just for a wind-up. On a MB it's not so easy to tell whether someone's a wind-up merchant (although we have had a few blatant practioners on here in the past), so sometimes my hackles rise instinctively!
But if you're really worried about water as a pollutant, worry about fossil fuels. Burning hydrocarbons produces not only CO2 but H2O as well. Both these are greenhouse gases.
The water released is fossil water, in that it was locked away by chemical reactions for thousands or millions of years, but I don't think its volume in the liquid state is that great a problem on its own. (But if I'm wrong, all the more reason to quit using fossil fuels and develop practical electric cars!) |
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| Peripart is only passing through
Great Old One Joined: 01 Aug 2005 Total posts: 3851 Age: 45 Gender: Male |
| Posted: 19-04-2009 15:23 Post subject: |
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| rynner2 wrote: | | But if I'm wrong, all the more reason to quit using fossil fuels and develop practical electric cars! |
There's still the knotty problem of where the electricity comes from, or the environmental cost of sourcing rare materials for, and of building, fuel-cell or other electric vehicles.
Hence, I guess, your cunning use of the word "practical"... |
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