How can you strip Hydrogen from Water (the H2 from the H20)?

Question

If you wanted to use hydrogen as an energy source, how would you strip the Hydrogen molecules from Water (the H2 from the H20)

Answer 1

Dogzilla's got it. You run an electric current through the water. Oxygen gas bubbles are generated at the positive electrode and hydrogen gas at the negative electrode. You can capture them separately (a good thing, since they're explosive if mixed together)

However, keep in mind that the electricity has to come from somewhere. If you use hydroelectric, wind or solar power to make your electricity, then your process will be sustainable. If you use coal or oil to make the electricity, you'll get less energy out in the form of hydrogen than you put in in the form of fossil fuel, due to the natural inefficiencies in the process.

Answer 2

A better source of hydrogen would be alcohol.

Although fuel cells are hardly practical, due to their high cost, at least one car ran from the west coast to the east coast a few years ago - and it was powered entirely from a fuel cell. The fuel cell got it's hydrogen from alcohol. That was done through some kind of catalytic process.

WATER is what you get when a fuel cell has combined hydrogen and oxygen, and it's released as a wast product. When hydrogen is stripped from water, it has to be MANUFACTURED through a process of electrolysis. And the only practical way of doing that, is when you have a cheap and convenient source of electricity.

Iceland has a hydrogen economy, because it gets cheap energy - and free electricity - from underground thermal vents and geysers. Other than that? The only practical way you are going to get a hydrogen economy going in the United States, would be if we had a lot more nuclear reactors.

In other words? The so-called "hydrogen economy" that President Bush got everybody so excited about is a lie. It's not practical in the near future. We don't have the technology, the resources, or the infrastructure for it.

The oil companies want to "work on hydrogen", because the technology is SO FAR off into the future, that for all practical purposes, they don't have to do anything today. Nothing at all in the present gets done, except "theoretical work" and studies.

They like it like that - because they can sit on their rear ends and do NOTHING. And at the same time? They can put on a show for the public, and convince them they have some kind of working plan. In reality? They have NO PLAN except to keep jacking the price of gasoline up, until the oil runs out - or until the public is no longer willing to accept it.

Alcohol is a MUCH BETTER fuel than "studies", which were financed in part by the oil companies, have led people to believe. It's also a green fuel. Even though it emits carbon dioxide - it does not contribute to global warming - because the CO2 is absorbed again by the NEXT crop of plants that are grown for their alcohol.

As a matter of fact? The Model -T Ford, and other early cars ran off of pure alcohol. GASOLINE simply wasn't widely available. And during the second world war, alcohol was cost competitive with gasoline. What killed it? Legislation by the oil companies.

It was TAXED to death.

And then came the religious groups - and prohibition.

Otherwise? We might easily have been running on an alcohol based economy today - and the ENTIRE situation of politics in the Middle East could have taken a decidedly different turn.

We could tell the Arabs to just screw themselves, for example.

Answer 3

Electrolysis....You run an electric current through the water. The hydrogen will be released at the positive electrode, and will rise to the surface. Capture it under an airtight container.

You should have done this experiment in your high school science class.

Answer 4

Hi. Electrolysis breaks down the water into oxygen and hydrogen. The oxygen could be sold to recover some of the cost.

Answer 5

Even if you can, the process of separating the hydrogen is currently more expensive than just making pure hydrogen.

Answer 6

it is very hard and very exspensive