Saltwater as fuel

[Becker4]

Speaking of hydrogen energy, this is also quite interesting. Uses a reaction between an aluminum alloy and water to create hydrogen as it is needed, making it much easier to handle. After the reaction, the aluminum oxide can be recycled back and used again, which is where the energy for the process comes from. I didn't see the efficiency figures for that process in this article but have heard him speak about it on a radio show and he said it is currently at 50 percent, hopefully soon to be at 75. It is a process which is already common and industrialized.

info here:
http://news.uns.purdue.edu/x/2007a/0705 ... rogen.html
with videos at the bottom of the page

and here:
http://www.sciencefriday.com/pages/2007 ... 60107.html

you can listen to the radio show I mentioned by downloading, through itunes, the science friday podcast in the second link for free.

cheers.

EDIT: It is actually the recycling of the gallium and the aluminum which is critical. The reaction has the waste products: hydrogen, gallium, and aluminum oxide (alumina). The gallium is not reacted, it is just allows the aluminum to react with the water. The alumina is what can be recycled and re-used as aluminum in the process at 50-75 percent efficiency.

[Carlos]

Another article on the subject:

http://www.physorg.com/news98556080.html

[Mikey_s]

Sorry if I start to sound like I'm pooping on the parade, but I think it's important to postulate on the efficiency of the processes;

I spent a couple of years working on a project with primary aluminium smelters; Did you know that for every tonne of aluminium (or aluminum for the US folks ) that is produced 1.5 tonnes of CO2 is produced from the process (Hall Heroult)? - this does not take into account the CO2 produced from the electricity generation, only the chemistry of reduction of 2 x Al2O3 to 4Al + 3 O2 - which then reacts with the carbon anode to make 3 CO2 molecules (not to mention the CFCs that are produced by side reactions)... Now, in the example given the researcher speaks of the energy for Aluminium production being produced from a nuclear power plant - so no CO2 from there, but alumina is incredibly stable, that's why aluminium is able to reduce the water to produce hydrogen and why it takes so much energy to rip it apart (or recycle it as the chap says!!). By the way, not much need to recycle it; Aluminium is the most abundant metallic element in the earths crust and alumina is used in HUGE quantities for aluminium production.

A propos of not very much, the process for manufacturing Aluminium is awesome; modern potlines run at 350kA and a cell of 500kA is planned!!! - aluminium smelters use gigawatts of electricity, if you ever saw one you would NEVER throw an aluminium drinks can away - and you'd stop using aluminium foil completely!! and the magnetic fields generated by the smelters are incredible - they even magnetise non-ferrous metals (especially watches and credit cards!!)

I think the technology aspect of these inventions is extremely interesting and it is important to consider alternative methods of releasing stored energy, but ... and it's a big but, the efficiency of the process is the truly important issue for the future of the planet. Whatever is investigated must be more efficient than the processes we have today, otherwise it's pointless. We all know that Hydrogen burns cleanly, but it's pointless to burn a nice clean fuel in our lawnmower if the local power station is throwing out twice as much CO2 as a consequence - the nice warm feeling we get from producing water might just be due to climate change!!

For me the issue is efficient use of chemistry and I cannot see any useful application of these technologies in power generation. Today we use engines with an energy efficiency below 35% - of which an average of 15% finds it's way to moving us around... it's crazy and F1 should be free to let the creative minds find something hugely more efficient to propel us around the planet.

(...stands back waiting to be flamed )

Edit;
By the way, I would be astonished if the overall energy of the process was even close to 50% and it is inconceivable that it is 70%. Power generation is not that efficient and fuel cells are not that efficient either - aluminium production certainly is not that efficient - no clue about gallium production! In assessing the efficiency of the process it is crucial to look at the whole life cycle, not just the part where the Hydrogen is generated (and then used).

[checkered]

Mikey_s, I'd rather commend

than flame you! I don't presently have enough time to really explore the aluminium alloy/water proposition to my content, but your insight into the inner workings of aluminum smelters was exciting - I haven't really had to consider anything but the finished product and its properties in any depth before. Didn't know about the carbon anodes etc.

I always took aluminium as one of the more ecologically sound metals to use and recycle for its lightness and the fact that I was told that much of it is being produced with abundant geothermal/hydropower energy in Iceland, hence thought that there need not be that much CO2 emission associated with the process. I never went as far as looking into what percentage of the total production capacity actually is located in Iceland. Maybe you have some idea ... along with an idea about how aluminium actually compares with other metals with its energy/carbon/CO2 cycles?

http://www.invest.is/Key-Sectors/Energy-in-Iceland/
http://www.alcoa.com/iceland/en/home.asp

Efficiency (especially life cycle efficiency) we actually must improve, a point which I've been advocating in a couple of posts on this site already. To me, the current figures are actually mindbogglingly poor ... dispensing with any deeper logic it would seem that we could achieve a better efficiency than 15% by pure chance than the current designs, or by just going back to burning twigs or something. Of course it's not so, it has taken a lot of bright ideas to get this far, which only highlights the amount of investment and commitment we need to put into thinking efficiency and the energy cycles anew.

Since you took up fuel cell efficiency, here are some figures I found a while ago. Haven't actually attempted proving these beyond a doubt to myself, but they seem plausible and hey, there are just 24 hrs to a day. Anyway, electrical efficiencies seem to range from 25% - 60% ... no mention about the whole cycles, though.

http://www1.eere.energy.gov/hydrogenand ... types.html
http://www1.eere.energy.gov/hydrogenand ... _chart.pdf

[Mikey_s]

Thx checkered,

I'll check out your links in a min, but the 'green' credentials of aluminium depend very much upon what you do with it. I saw a few life cycle analyses of the use in the automotive and aerospace fields where it seems that the lightweight properties of the product outweigh the CO2 emissions from manufacture in respect of fuel savings over the life cycle of the product... and then it can be recycled - which saves approx 90% of the energy used in manufacture from raw materials... so everyone really should recycle every scrap of aluminium.

As for the factors affecting where you put a smelter... there is really ony one critical issue; cheap and plentiful electricity - nothing else matters! Approx 30% of the US aluminium production went offline a few years back when a) they figured it was more profitable to sell the electricity they purchased from the Bonneville Power Authority under contract, then b) when the BPA contract ran out and they couldn't negotiate cheap power anymore the plants were closed.

It's a few years since I worked on the project, but my latest figures (about 4 years out of date now) suggested Iceland was producing about 230kT/a of aluminium - in a world market of some 22 millionT/a - so not a huge producer in worldwide terms - the big countries or US (of course!!), Canada, mainly Quebec, but there is a big smelter in BC, Scandinavia, S Africa, Russia (of course!!) and China (of course!!)

Some information on life cycle here http://www.world-aluminium.org/environm ... ycle2.html

As for use in cans and foil - I have no clue of the volumes, nor the energy balance over alternatives, but for goodness sake recycle the stuff!!!

It's always useful to look at the bigger picture; wind turbines are great, I love them, but they produce overall about 25% of their design efficiency.

Hydroelectric is also great, and renewable, but in their early life the projects release VAST quantities of methane (a very potent greenhouse gas) as the vegetation in the flooded valley rots.

Of course wind and water are renewable, so in principle they can keep on producing, but it is interesting to ponder these things... However, my view is that nuclear is the way forward for the foreseeable future.

must do some proper work now!

[Richard]

I presume the radio waves are at a frequency to excite the salt which then heats the water, but that frequency doesn't excite any of the elements naturally found in the human body?

Not sure why people are talking about 1st law of thermodynamics. The guy is simply using a huge amount of electricity to convert water to H and O which can then be burned to turn a motor. Of course it would be more efficient to use that electricity to turn a motor.

That film clip also shows classic dumb down science. When the reporter says the idea came at night we were shown a picture of the moon.... phew ... that night concept was confusing me. If that is what night is, then what it is called when it is dark but there is no moon

[Fil]

When the reporter says the idea came at night we were shown a picture of the moon.... phew ... that night concept was confusing me. If that is what night is, then what it is called when it is dark but there is no moon

Darkness.

[Izzy410]

I cannot produce hydrogen directly from water in my microwave: water would boil well before reaching that temperature (and the plastic door would fuse! ). So, I guess the antennas used by this inventor are NOT tuned to water absorption frequencies. I'd love to know which are the frequencies used: that information would provide Mikey with the data needed to understand "what is being energized". I wonder if it works by matching somehow the frequencies of the bonds between oxygen and hydrogen in water (that's pure speculation on my side... I really don't understand how that "bond energizing" could be acomplished, if it is feasible at all).

apart from the microwave door fusing shut, i thought PURE water cant boil. it takes some degree of foreign material to boil. that's why if you put in distilled water into your microwave and heat it, it will be higher than 100 Celcius. and once you shake it BOOM! -.-

If im wrong someone please do tell. lol sorry for opening an old thread


EDIT : i was proven wrong. kay no more saying im wrong

[scosworth]

Good discussion by all. Laws of thermodynamics are rather undeniable. The radio wave frequency must not affect water evidently. When a hand is placed in the beam, nothing happens to the water in the hand. Water makes up about 90% of the human body. Also, the kitchen microwave is tuned to the water's hydrogen-oxygen molecular bond. It causes the molecule to vibrate harmonically. This kinetic energy is what we measure as heat on our themometers. If the microwaves are of sufficient intensity, the water in a sample or object would reach the flash point of steam and explode. Clearly, this is not happening to the hand in the beam.

The possibility of the dissolved salt is interesting. Yes, the flame is predominately yellow from the sodium atom excitement, so it has to be involved somehow. It would be interesting to know if the pH of the water changes to a higher level which would indicate production of the hydroxide ion as well as hydrogen. A good question is that of what is happening to the chloride ion.

The nature of dissolved ionic substances is that water molecules are attracted to the charged ion. Water is a polar molecule which means that it has a positive side and a negative side so to speak. If you run a thin stream of water from a faucet, the steam can be deflected by the charge on a hair comb after combing your hair a few times.

The other weird thought about salt is that sea water and blood are actually very similar in content. If salt were some kind of catalyst in the process, wouldn't the same thing happen in a person's hand since it also contains salt water in essence?

[Edis]

Also, the kitchen microwave is tuned to the water's hydrogen-oxygen molecular bond. It causes the molecule to vibrate harmonically.

That is actually just a myth. Most microwaves operate with a frequency of 2.45 GHz (which is nowhere near the resonant frequency of water) simply because that frequency is availible and won't interfere with other electronic equipment.

A microwave oven heats water by dielectric heating, caused by dipole rotation.

[casper]

Here is the link to the research, called the Kanzius Machine.

http://peswiki.com/index.php/Directory: ... adio_Waves