got oil?

[MunsonGTA]

http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,660227927,00.html

put all that oil in with the oil we have up in alaska, and the deep pocket down in the gulf... and we'll have enough for another 200 years or so probably. i'm not really for it though.

i'd rather see the conversion to e85, much cleaner and it supports farmers.

[MN6WS6]

Conversion to E85 takes more corn than we can make, it is less energy efficient, and it actually takes more natural resources as it cannot be piped, it has to be trucked, which uses even MORE fuel. Electric won't work due to the byproducts of the batteries. The true solution would be hydrogen, or making an engine run off of water. But big oil would never let that happen.

[MunsonGTA]

Conversion to E85 takes more corn than we can make, it is less energy efficient, and it actually takes more natural resources as it cannot be piped, it has to be trucked, which uses even MORE fuel. Electric won't work due to the byproducts of the batteries. The true solution would be hydrogen, or making an engine run off of water. But big oil would never let that happen.

you never know. i read an article a couple weeks ago on a possible alternate fuel. a college professor shot some radio waves at salt water, it burned... they're thinking it might be possible to turn it into a motor setup, that would run on salt water, which is all over the place.

[sneitzel]

...a college professor shot some radio waves at salt water, it burned...

But how much energy (electricity) was consumed to generate the intense radio waves necessary to break the bonds in the water and generate H2 and O2?

[Joshu]

Extremely low if I recall. Back in 8th grade I remember running a current with batteries (like D's) through the water and collecting the Hydrogen and O2 in the test tubes. The thing is it can't create enough to power a vehicle.
On the other hand, radio waves are not electricity. It is energy, but not electricity so I can't really compare it (the radio waves and salt water) to my middle school experiment.

[sneitzel]

We use H2 generators in our lab instead of compressed H2 cylinders.
They work on the principal you mentioned, passing a HV electric current between 2 poles in the presence of a catalyst to decompose water into H2 and O2.
The reaction works fine but is not very efficient. The unit can deliver 200ml/min at 60 psi (no where close to enough to power an engine), runs on a 120V/40A circuit and would barely fit in the passenger seat of a car. Oh, and even using purified DI water it needs to be descaled/catalyst replaced every 6 months.

I'm not aware of the specifics of the radio wave version but I'm guessing it's just a proof of concept not a full working system.

The point here is there are many alternative power sources out there that look great on paper and work fine in proof of concept testing but just are not economical, practical, safe or rugged enough for use in a vehicle......yet

[MunsonGTA]

i knew it was a newer technology. but that doesn't mean 10 years from now it won't be possible. just some articles on the subject.

http://peswiki.com/index.php/Directo...ng_Radio_Waves

http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/1578

http://freeenergynews.com/Directory/...ion/Bob_Boyce/

[Roger in Kensington]

Conversion to E85 takes more corn than we can make, it is less energy efficient, and it actually takes more natural resources as it cannot be piped, it has to be trucked, which uses even MORE fuel. Electric won't work due to the byproducts of the batteries. The true solution would be hydrogen, or making an engine run off of water. But big oil would never let that happen.

At the risk of repeating myself (and, of course, I never repeat myself), as regards hydrogen I quote from my post of March 2006:

FastTA has the essential “element” (no pun intended) of the problem with hydrogen. Hydrogen is not a “primary fuel” like oil, natural gas, coal or wood. It has to be manufactured, and it is most inexpensively manufactured commercially by steam reformation: methane plus water (as steam under high pressure and with a nickel catalyst) producing carbon monoxide and hydrogen. There is then a second reaction (called the “water-gas shift”) where the carbon monoxide is combined with water (again as high-pressure steam) to produce carbon dioxide and more hydrogen.

You could produce hydrogen by electrolysis, but this is prohibitively expensive. For one thing, most electricity is produced using “fossil fuels” and, considering the efficiency of the typical power plant and the amount of energy required to produce hydrogen via electrolysis, about 4 units of energy are wasted for every unit of hydrogen produced. Burning a gallon of gasoline produces about 20 pounds of carbon dioxide. Producing a kilogram of hydrogen (which has about the same energy as a gallon of gasoline) via electrolysis produces about 70 pounds of carbon dioxide. Very wasteful.

Fuel cells were invented in the late 1830’s (before internal combustion engines) in London by Sir William Grove who devised a way to reverse the electrolysis process. That’s all a fuel cell is. Instead of converting water to hydrogen, a fuel cell converts hydrogen to water. High-temperature fuel cells can run directly on methane as they are able to reform methane into hydrogen internally, but such high-temperature fuel cells are unsuitable for transportation purposes. Proton exchange membrane fuel cells are being developed for transportation and home energy use, but they require an external reformer. The overall efficiency of these PEM fuel cells using an external reformer is around 35 to 40 percent, about the same as an internal combustion engine. And these PEM fuel cells are (as of 2003) about 30 times more expensive than an internal combustion engine of similar power.

Hydrogen is difficult and costly to compress, store and transport. As a liquid, it has only about a fourth the energy as the same volume of gasoline, and about 40 percent of the energy in the hydrogen is required to liquify it. Moreover, liquid hydrogen requires large amounts of energy to remain in the liquid state and is very volatile. The General Motors experimental vehicle using liquid hydrogen for its on-board PEM fuel cell loses about 4 percent of its hydrogen per day from evaporation even when it is standing still. (NASA loses about 100,000 pounds of hydrogen to evaporation each time it fuels the space shuttle.)

Compressed hydrogen? A 5,000 psi tank of compressed hydrogen would occupy about ten times more volume than a tank of gasoline with the same amount of energy.

And imagine what happens in a collision when that hydrogen tank ruptures. Which is more likely to happen anyway as hydrogen is highly reactive and makes steel brittle over time.

These are just some of the problems (there are others) with hydrogen for use as a transportation fuel. High cost of manufacture, low energy density, difficult to store and transport, and no net environmental advantage (maybe even a net environmental disadvantage).

What’s better? Probably an e-hybrid (that is, a “plug-in” rechargeable hybrid) of high efficiency for “around town” use. This, too, has its problems as it will require more power plants.

But as I have pointed out in a previous post, there is no lack of oil – or natural gas – available domestically for use in additional power plants. Nuclear is also an option. All we have to do is remove the obstacles to its use.

I hope this helps to explain my position regarding hydrogen as a transportation fuel. Please feel free to correct me if I misunderstand the situation.

[MN6WS6]

I didn't know all of that about hydrogen, so forgive me if anybody actually thought I knew what the heck I was talking about when it comes to hydrogen. HOWEVER, there is no way the world can run on oil forever as it is a finite resource. Regardless of how wasteful it is, hydrogen is still an option. We've got to come up with something, and since I don't think they'll let us drive around with a nuclear fission reactor in the trunk, hydrogen will be the way they will steer eventually, unless they have some massive breakthrough on batteries or solar power (which would still have to have batteries).

Truth be told, you could make your own electric vehicle with batteries that you plugged in every 50 miles with today's technology if you had about 7 or 8 grand to invest in it. Downside is you have to give up any unneccessary weight, no AC, maybe a radio, and take it easy on things like headlight usage and wipers. Not a fun way to drive, but doable. Kinda like an old Volkswagen Beetle!

Regardless, I'm going to drive high horsepower, fuel sucking vehicles and continue to contribute to the destruction of finite resources while burning tires and making passes at the dragstrip