On Thu, 31 May 2007 13:58:37 -0700, wrote:

the problem is, all carbon based fuels release CO2 when burned.

what we need is to break the hydrogen oxygen bond in water and then burn
the hydrogen
back to water. plants do this, they use solar energy to knock the
hydrogen off the
water, use the energy of the electrons to form a covalent bond (organic)
that stores
the energy (using CO2). That is really clean energy.

Ingrid


That sounds nice but it costs significantly more to extract hydrogen from
water then to produce it any other way. The most economical way at present
to produce hydrogen on a massive scale is steam reforming of the methane
in natural gas or coal gas in which the gas is combined with superheated
steam, releasing hydrogen and carbon dioxide. CH4+2H2O=4H2+CO2 if I got my
chemistry right. This is the Bush hydrogen initiative. No improvement in
carbon dioxide emissions, but it would be a boon for the natural gas and
coal industries. And that's the real point of it.

Lorenzo L. Love
http://home.thegrid.net/~lllove

"Choose your leaders with wisdom and forethought. To be led by a coward is
to be controlled by all that the coward fears. To be led by a fool is to
be led by the opportunists who control the fool. To be led by a thief is
to offer up your most precious treasures to be stolen. To be led by a liar
is to ask to be lied to. To be led by a tyrant is to sell yourself and
those you love into slavery."
Octavia Butler