My green energy idea, is it feasible?

I'm the first to admit that my knowledge of chemistry is poor at best, so please correct me when im wrong.

"Hydrogen from water"
Most people know hydrogen can be produced from water, a lot of people know how easy it can be done, and that the only bi-product is water.
there are a couple of ways of producing hydrogen from H2O, but for my idea, i will stick with electrolysis.

witcombe.sbc.edu...

As i understand, the main problem extracting hydrogen using electrolysis is the fact it uses more energy than it creates "the laws of thermodynamics". i will come back to this problem later.
Now the next problem is where my lack of knowledge leaves me dry. hydrogen is apperantly hard to control and could result in a large explosion, and engines using hydrogen just wouldnt last long enough due to the violence (for want of a better word) of hyrogen combustion.
I find it hard to believe that in this day and age we cannot overcome this problem. I can see how this was an issue 60yrs ago, but we have come along way!
Yes i blame the oil companys!

My idea involves building Hydrogen plants on or near coast lines using the ocean water to produce the hydrogen to power electicty stations.
sea levels are rising are they not? and the majority of Earths population reside along coast lines.
and to kill another bird with the same stone, these plants could also double as desalinisation plants.

Now back to the first problem. could we not produce enough power/electricty to electrolysis the H2O through solar power and by harnessing the power of the tidel forces of the ocean? hell....couldnt we just use the power the ocean creates in its tide alone?

on a side-note, while doing some fishing on the weekend at my local river, i started thinking about the energy going to waste, this river flows strongly everyday, every year. There has to be a simple way to harness some of that energy.
somthing like this but on a smaller scale "hydro-electric power station"www.snowyhydro.com.au...

i can understand people dont want an eye-sore on their coast, but i am sick of all the dirty coal burning stations.

what do you think?

I can't give exact figures, but the reason de-salination isn't widespread is because of the cost of the process. It's just too much to de-salinate when we can just recyle water and encourage the corporate world to use less fresh water when possible.

With power, I'm pretty sure your proposed method would be very difficult to implement and would also cost much, much more than fossil fuel or nuclear power, especially given our wealth of minerals.

wealth of minerals??? they are finite and run out eventually

I have a better idea.

Utilize geothermal heat for the steam required for turbines. Dig in to the earth enough and you will find heat in abundance. Also utilize liquids that boil quicker than water.

Build a push pull energy capture system that utilizes the push/pull mechanism of the ocean tides.

reply to post by tegz_1


Yeah but we have enough uranium to last ourselves a very long time, considering we have 23% of the worlds supply which is the most of any nation..

By switching to nuclear power you would need to have the plants at a coastal location and with a low chance of a tsunami striking its a safe prospect. Nuclear power would also free up a lot more fresh water as it can be operated on sea water and would effectively kill your two birds with one stone.

www.world-nuclear.org...

reply to post by BigBruddah

the reason de-salination isn't widespread is because of the cost of the process. It's just too much to de-salinate when we can just recyle water and encourage the corporate world to use less fresh water when possible.

i thought that maybe after the hydrogen was burnt the bi-product might be usable fresh water that could be captured.
but like i have said my kwoledge on this matter is so poor i shouldnt even enertain thoughts on the subject let alone post a thread

With power, I'm pretty sure your proposed method would be very difficult to implement and would also cost much, much more than fossil fuel or nuclear power, especially given our wealth of minerals.

unless we could find a way to convert coal stations to run on hydrogen and pump water to them.

reply to post by LightAssassin

Utilize geothermal heat for the steam required for turbines. Dig in to the earth enough and you will find heat in abundance. Also utilize liquids that boil quicker than water.

yes, i think ive heard Iceland is doing this or similar
www.scientificamerican.com...

reply to post by BigBruddah


i would rather nuclear power over coal, and i understand that we can build very safe nuclear sites now. but i would still not feel comfortable living close to one.

the idea about hydrogen is not bad at all, but there are specific disadvantages.

First of all, let me bring to your attention that 'energy' and its usability is rated or ranked if you will so.
This rating includes how much other (lower ranked) energy must be invested to actually have the desired energy not only available, but available in the place you actually need it, along with the amount you can have from it at a specific timespan.

the ultimate and best usable energy is electric energy, hence its the most expensive to create.

hydrogen has specific disadvantages if it comes to handling it, or transport it into a location where you can use it.
The reason for this is: pure hydrogen-atoms are so small compared to other atoms, they sneak out of its containment, cause no matter what you build to keep it contained, the container looks in this like a fishnet and the hydrogen like fish who will make use of the gaps.
so you need to find a feasable way to convert it somehow to a form which can be transported to the location where you intend to use it and convert it back.

as you might imagine converting it twice requires ....wait for it .... energy

this containment issue is not that much a problem if you intend to use hydrogen right on spot and if you can live with the losses. But in everyday life (imagine all cars would drive that way) the losses may sum up and sooner as you think you stand in a hughe cloud of leaked hydrogen and find another reason why smoking is hazardous.

summary: hydrogen = great, longterm storage = poor

so its not always the question about how easy it is to gernerate a specific fuel or energy, its also important to see where you can generate it, and how you can transport it where you actually need it

electric energy btw. has a related problem
imagine all the sun in a desert you can use to generate electrical power from.
this is also just great, but to actually transport the energy to the location you need it you have to accept severe losses for the reason that a power line has a form of electrical resistance which is proportional to its length.
Now you say: 'well just build superconducting wires' no problem, we can have that too, btu they requiere to be colder than -140°C ...and what do you need for that .... wait for it .... energy, to cool them down.

so whatever it is
its not about how smart you can convert one form of energy into another
its always about how good you can do that along with having it available where you actually need it

There is a fair bit around on running your car on water and it has been around for some time. Some of it sounds like a bit of scamming going on, but also some very interesting systems, results and situations around when looking into it. There are some issues involved with the storage and use of hydrogen as mistakes do make quite a mess so having a system that can produce hydrogen on demand is a much safer option.

There is a growing supply of wave and tidal generators entering the market. This can be done many ways and comes down financial considerations for success.

As for the geothermal energy sources, there has been a lot of success with heat sources that are close to the surface as with New Zealand for one example. Things become very problematic when tapping into deep heat sources. The high pressures and limited access to the heat source present very difficult engineering challenges and presents many risks including contamination issues as with fracking and potentially create new fault lines or volcanic vents as the Earth's crust is significantly breached.