What would happen to the environment if hydrogen became a fule source?

Question

Right now the water cycle is a closed system. If hydrogen became a fuel source, how would that throw off the ecological balance of water in the environment?
Even if we recover hydrogen from water, is it a closed system or does it have leaks.

Answer 1

I suppose if we used Wind and Solar energy to produce the hydrogen that would eliminate the production leak. However, I was told the only bi-product of burning hydrogen gas was water? This, chemically, doesn't make sense. Can anyone add to this?

Answer 2

If hydrogen were available to use as a fuel source, then burning it would add water to the planet and remove oxygen from the air. But the amount of both would be so small as to be totally unimportant, at least with the amount of energy we are using now. One could imagine some future where we use a million times more energy where it could be an issue, but not today. The main problem is that there is no source of hydrogen we can tap, at least not on this planet. We have to make the hydrogen. Most hydrogen today is made from natural gas, and the process isn't any cleaner than just burning the natural gas directly in your engine. (natural gas IS a much cleaner fuel than gasoline, but I digress.)

If we use electricity to split water into hydrogen and oxygen, then the cycle is closed and has no loss that I can think of. The only problem is finding enough electricity to split the water. It takes more electrical energy to split the water than burning the hydrogen in a generator could produce. In that case, a tank of hydrogen can be though of as a charged battery, where and empty hydrogen tank would be like a discharged battery. Hydrogen acts as an energy storage device, not a source of energy, in that case.

Answer 3

What is likely to happen to the environment when hydrogen replaces fossil fuels is:

1.CO2 content of the atmosphere will stop increasing
2.Biological wastes like corn stalks, fallen trees, paper will not rot and release their stored Methane and carbon dioxide
3.Ground level smog will be reduced - if we burn hydrogen in air unburnt pollutants like diesel fumes will be turned into less harmful carbon dioxide
4.Net effect on water supply is zero provided we take the water from the atmosphere or surface water
5.Places that are desperate for clean drinking water will be able to drink, cook, and bath with the exhaust from hydrogen internal combustion engines.

Chemically water plus energy = hydrogen gas and oxygen gas represented by the formula: H2O + energy = H2 + (1/2)O2

hydrogen and oxygen plus ignition source = water vapor represented by this formula: H2 + O = H2O

Hydrogen burned in air (a mixture of 70+% nitrogen, 20+%oxygen, and many many other gases making up the last 5-10%) versus pure oxygen environment will produce small amounts of nitrogen oxygen molecules like N20 or NO. Not good to be inhaling but far far far fewer than created by burning gasoline.

Answer 4

Hydrogen is an energy carrier, not a source of energy. Hydrogen stores electon and releases electon to produce power. As such, another source must charge it, like you would charge a rechargeable battery. Whether hydrogen atom would have any impact on the environment would depend on what is used to charge hydrogen. If coal is used, obviously, environment would be hurt but if solar (or any other environmentally friendly source) is used, it would help.

Hydrogen is hyped as clean energy but if you look closely at lot of ads touting its advantages, you will see solar panels that are actually producing the energy that will enable hydrogen to deliver the power.

Answer 5

Apparently BMW made a concept car which relied on hydrogen fuel cells. It uses a cannister of Hydrogen and a chamber inside the engine takes in oxygen and fuses the atoms together to form bi products of energy and water I think (please confirm this) they say its almost efficient but acquiring oxygen takes up a lot of energy. London buses are also using concept prototypes as well which run on the same resource

Answer 6

No effect. Remember, hydrogen is not a prime energy source. It is an energy transfer medium. That's because it takes energy to create hydrogen from water. As to 'leaks', those are also immaterial. Our atmosphere is 21% oxygen. Any hydrogen that escapes will simply combine with that O2 to become pure water.

Answer 7

Led Zeppelin would have a whole new set of pictures to select album covers from.....b

http://www.college-optometrists.org/filemanager/root/site_assets/museum/contactlens/Hindenburg_disaster.jpg

Answer 8

A bi-product would be produced. Some people say that would be acid.