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Shop: Myyco.com Golden Teacher Liquid Culture For Sale   Unfolding Nature Unfolding Nature: Being in the Implicate Order

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can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat?
    #9052248 -

if you can get elecricity and heat from hydrogen, why couldn't someone set up a solar panel which does hydrolysis to make the hydrogen, and there ya have it, your house is off the grid?

Edited by sleepy (10/09/08 06:15 AM)

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: sleepy]
    #9052293 -

> if you can get elecricity and heat from hydrogen

When you burn hydrogen and oxygen, you can get electricity (and water) out.  This is how the space shuttle produced electricity while in orbit.

> why couldn't someone set up a solar panel which does hydrolysis to make the hydrogen, and there ya have it, your house is off the grid?

Efficiency and cost.


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Just another spore in the wind.

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: sleepy]
    #9052370 -

one panel costing 2000 would produce enough hydrogen to power a whole house, no?

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: sleepy]
    #9053377 -

Your house uses electricity, not hydrogen.  Why would you take a solar panel -> get electricity -> turn that into hydrogen -> turn back into electricity; thats inefficent.  It would be better to just use the electricity the panal gives you and not fuck with hydrogen at all right? 

You can do that, but as Seuss said, its extremely expensive and takes alot of space (think more expensive than you house and more space than you plot probably)

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: DieCommie]
    #9053624 -

DieCommie said:
Your house uses electricity, not hydrogen.  Why would you take a solar panel -> get electricity -> turn that into hydrogen -> turn back into electricity; thats inefficent.  It would be better to just use the electricity the panal gives you and not fuck with hydrogen at all right? 



its not inefficient, if it was, why do they use it on the space shuttle?

a solar panel can produce enough electricity to get hydrolysis going to produce hydrogen, which is an extremely powerful source of energy.  i'm not neccessarily talking about turning the hydrogen into electricty, but burning it to heat water, as well as making electricity.  the question is, how much hydrogen can you get from one solar cell?  the hardware wouldn't be any bigger than a regular oil burning furnace

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: sleepy]
    #9053639 -

i dont see why this costs alot.  youjust need a solar panel, a hydrolysis machine (can be homemade for cheap), then a tank to hold the hydrogen/oxygen, and then a boiler where you burn the h2/02 underneath a copper pipe

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: sleepy]
    #9053646 -

It is inefficient.  Every time you turn one form of energy into another you lose some.  Turning your electricity from the panel into hydrogen causes you to lose some.  If you just use the electricity straight from the panel you will have more energy.

Better to heat your water with that electricity rather than turn it into hydrogen and then heat the water.

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: sleepy]
    #9053655 -

sleepy said:
i dont see why this costs alot.  youjust need a solar panel, a hydrolysis machine (can be homemade for cheap), then a tank to hold the hydrogen/oxygen, and then a boiler where you burn the h2/02 underneath a copper pipe


Have you run any numbers at all?  What kind of wattage are you looking to pull?

There is no way you are doing this with less than an acre of land and tens of thousands of dollars (at least).  I wish it were cheap and easy, but it is not.

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: sleepy]
    #9054019 -

sleepy said:
if you can get elecricity and heat from hydrogen, why couldn't someone set up a solar panel which does hydrolysis to make the hydrogen, and there ya have it, your house is off the grid?


A word on nomenclature.  The solar panel would provide current for 'electrolysis' (meaning to cleave with electricity).  'Hydrolysis' is a chemical reaction where water acts to cleave a different molecule.  The two refer to different reactions and aren't interchangeable.

If your goal is to get heat energy from the sun, there are specialized solar panels which use a process fluid to directly gather the heat by being irradiated by the sun.  This hot process fluid is then used to heat home water so as to reduce the heat-duty on your hot water heater.

The process of going from Sun -> electricity -> hydrogen -> heat will result in much more energy loss due to entropy.


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Edited by Minstrel (10/09/08 02:32 PM)

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: sleepy]
    #9054194 -



Use salt water and radiowaves!


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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: sleepy]
    #9054239 -

> why do they use it on the space shuttle?

Sorry, I wasn't clear.  They take up bottled oxygen and bottled hydrogen.  Combining the two, they get water and electricity out.  They can use the water created for drinking, cooking, etc.  They do not take up water, break it apart with solar, then recombine it.


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Just another spore in the wind.

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: Seuss]
    #9054373 -

Do they recombine it by combustion or through a fuel cell? Surely it's the latter.

LuNaTiX said:
Use salt water and radiowaves!


I'm pretty sure that doesn't work.


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I know... that just the smallest
                                                part of the world belongs to me
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                                                    but truth is the hardest thing to see

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: zouden]
    #9054408 -

aren't they now putting solar cells ontop of cars to make hydrogen and then running the cars on hydrogen?  this would just be larger version for the home

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: sleepy]
    #9054483 -

No, they aren't doing that. Only the most advanced ultra-lightweight single-seater experimental cars are solar powered. If you hear about hydrogen-powered cars, they are talking about producing the hydrogen somewhere else then filling a tank in the car.


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I know... that just the smallest
                                                part of the world belongs to me
You know... I'm not a blind man
                                                    but truth is the hardest thing to see

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: sleepy]
    #9054578 -

It takes a lot more energy to split water into oxygen and hydrogen than burning the hydrogen releases, so your net energy gain is negative.

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: Le_Canard]
    #9054596 -

That's right, and since they can barely power a car directly with solar panels, going through the conversion process to hydrogen and back again is currently impossible.


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I know... that just the smallest
                                                part of the world belongs to me
You know... I'm not a blind man
                                                    but truth is the hardest thing to see

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: zouden]
    #9057877 -

Yeah, in high school I was talking with my drafting teacher about 'why don't they just power cars with a closed hydrogen power cell/ electrolysis engine'.  Not until now did I understand the concept of energy loss he was trying to convey.


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Do not argue with an idiot. He will drag you down to his level and beat you with experience.

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: sleepy]
    #9062653 -

I think the best description I have heard is that hydrogen can be considered to be like a battery. You put energy in to create hydrogen then later you get energy out of the hydrogen. This makes it portable. The portability is why it is used in cars and the space shuttle. It is not 100% efficient so you would only use it if you needed the portability.

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: sleepy]
    #9062794 -

ok now, hear me out, but what if you made like a 5000 gallon tank of water and hooked the electrodes of the electrolysis machine to a lightning rod, and use the lightning to turn it all into hydrogen?  would that work?

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: sleepy]
    #9062986 -

You wouldn't be able to get lightning to hit your lightning rod with sufficient frequency to make very much hydrogen a good percentage of the time (and that's IF you could have this setup last more than one strike).

Using lightning for energy, while looking good at first, always ends up being impracticable due to the very sporadic and random nature of lightning strikes.


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Once, men turned their thinking over to machines in the hope that this would set them free.
But that only permitted other men with machines to enslave them.

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: trendal]
    #9063052 -

Imagine how much energy it would take to dissociate 5000 gallons, I bet it would be alot!

edit - Ha, 1E12 Joules, more than a US citizen uses in a year.

Edited by Qubit (10/11/08 01:18 PM)

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: sleepy]
    #9064109 -

sleepy said:
ok now, hear me out, but what if you made like a 5000 gallon tank of water and hooked the electrodes of the electrolysis machine to a lightning rod, and use the lightning to turn it all into hydrogen?  would that work?


Too sporadic and too powerful in each burst. A better method would be to use photosynthesis to produce hydrogen, and let the sun do the work.


--------------------
I know... that just the smallest
                                                part of the world belongs to me
You know... I'm not a blind man
                                                    but truth is the hardest thing to see

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: zouden]
    #9064307 -

I think photosynthesis is less efficient than modern photovoltaics. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photosynthetic_efficiency

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: DieCommie]
    #9064322 -

Yes, but much cheaper.

That said, I used to work on photosynthetic hydrogen production, but I kinda feel it's a dead-end now. In fact I think hydrogen fuel in general is a bit unrealistic, compared to (say) biodiesel.


--------------------
I know... that just the smallest
                                                part of the world belongs to me
You know... I'm not a blind man
                                                    but truth is the hardest thing to see

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: zouden]
    #9065986 -

Yep, hydrogen on a mass scale is very unrealistic.  Even biodiesel is only worthwhile if the right feedstock is used (algae/cyanobacteria).


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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: DieCommie]
    #9067465 -

Quote:
The photosynthetic efficiency is the fraction of light energy converted into other forms of energy for use. 


OK, but how are they defining the total light energy here?  The amount that hits the surface of the leaf, the amount absorbed by the leaf, or the amount inducted into the photosynthetic pathway...?  I'm pretty sure the pathway itself is damn near 100% efficient.  It's only because leaves aren't very efficient at channeling solar energy into the pathway that the efficiency is so low.  Solar cells on the other hand are very good at absorbing light and putting it in their "pathway", but the conversion process is full of holes for this energy to leak out of the system through.  Maybe we'll see a hybrid system someday which combines the strengths of each.

Anyway, just a tangent...

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Re: can you create electricity from pure hydrogen? what about heat? [Re: ChuangTzu]
    #9067721 -

Of the total flux coming in, the plant converts around 5% of that into usable work, the panel converts between 10-15% into usable work.

Of course the catch is what zouden says... plants are cheaper and are being grown anyway.

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