Another Stupid Question?

[jomoco]

I know this is probably a stupid and possibly even naieve ( hope I spelled that wrong ) question for you brainy guys out there, but doesn't using clean renewable electric power to turn water into hydrogen release oxygen into the atmosphere sort of like trees do ?

Feel free to point out my stupidity to me !

[N9WOS]

Yes.

But I would say they will try to liquefy/bottle a good portion for the liquefied/compressed gas market.

If you think LoX is cheep now, wait until they start mass producing H2 for cars.

[electrondady1]

when an electric current is passed through water (h2o) hydrogen is not created .it is seperated from the oxygen. when hydrogen is burned as fuel it combines with oxygen to form water . fire , combustion, is a form oxidization like rust , or iron oxide. trees consume carbon dioxide . releaseing oxigen but retaining the carbon to build wood. when wood is burned it forms carbon dioxide or if it burns poorly it forns carbon monoxide perhapse water could also be called hyrogenmonoxide

[N9WOS]

The other name for water is Oxygen Dihydride.

[finnsawyer]

You haven't figured it out?  They're going to use all that Lox for the next big push into space.

[jomoco]

The point that I was trying to make is that it is within our reach to meet all of our power needs without burning fossil fuels or building nuclear reactors and all the other toxic forms of power generation currently in use today.

I can't quite understand why there isn't a bigger push from the scientific community or for that matter the more educated population itself, to demand a more rational approach to meeting our future power requirements. Why aren't the higher educational institutions putting more time effort and money into developing these nonpolluting forms of power generation staring us in the face? I'm not quite sure, but I'm beginning to suspect that the answers to these very rational questions, could be quite sinister. Could it really be that monetary greed on the part of a few short sighted energy consortiums, can actually trump the longterm well being of the rest of us? Is it possible for them to wield such power that they can buy off our repesentatives in government and education? I find it hard to believe, but can't quite escape the reality that it is happening right under our very noses.

Rather than whine about it, and wring our hands in futile despair, we must each insist that these oceans of potentialy clean power are put to use now today, not at some far off point in the future. The answers stare us in our collective faces, and like a parabolic solar collector, we must beam these intense rays onto the seats of power until they get up off their rumps and start acting in a more rational manner.

Excuse my ranting, but these things need to be pointed out, and brought into the light of day.

jomoco

[ghurd]

""I can't quite understand why...""

Money!

Too much is changing hands in one way (profit).

Not enough the other way (R+D).

Just 2 cents.

G-

[DBGenerator]

Too many people are making too much money off of oil.  

[finnsawyer]

I still can't get out of my mind the posting from the fellow in India about the building of a wind farm coinciding with a drop in rainfall in the general area.  I wish I had written down the site.  When you take energy out of the wind you slow it down.  Do this for a large enough area and...?

I don't know beyond wind what you have in mind for power generation, but both hydro and geothermal are severely limited.  I guess that leaves ony space based systems.  Earth based solar is too expensive today.

[jomoco]

Hey Fin,

How much of the potential wind power available do you think we've tapped into so far? Not to mention ocean wave and tidal power. The real problem is our leaderships suicidal fixation on oil, coal and nuclear!

[finnsawyer]

If you look at the wind profile with altitude the answer would be very little.  That said, lets consider the case where I live where we get a lot of lake effect snow.  Now these snow clouds are relatively low clouds.  Reducing the wind speed over a sizable area could slow down the movements of the clouds causing more snow to fall in one area and less in another.  Who knows?

[jomoco]

Carrying through with that sort of logic would mean what.... cutting down all the large trees that block the wind? I think I've done more than my share of that, though not for that reason.

You really don't mean to suggest that erecting enough windmills to supply the nation with clean electric power would somehow have detrimental consequences on our weather patterns..... do you?

jomoco

[finnsawyer]

All I'm saying is that there is anecdotal information to this effect.  Any time you affect a system changes will occur.  As far as cutting trees down, this does seem to coincide with a drying of the land.