On Fri, 12 Jul 2002, Fryday wrote:

> Well, isn't the whole point to find a process that is more efficient to
>  separate the hydrogen from the oxygen than to put them back together?

That can't happen.  It'd violate some pretty basic laws of physics.  It'd
be like dropping a rubber ball and having it bounce higher than the height
you dropped it from.  The energy has to *come* from somewhere.

> Interesting. Does that mean that hydrogen fuel cells would be nothing more than
>  energy transfered from plants running on fossil or reusable energy?

Yup.  That's why I'm so skeptical about them.  They have some of the same
problems electric cars do -- at least where I live, that energy is going
to be coming largely from a coal-fired power plant, probably resulting in
more total pollution.

             _ _
  __ _ _   _| | |  | David M. Brodbeck (N8SRE)              Ypsilanti, MI
 / _` | | | | | |  +-----------------------------------------------------
| (_| | |_| | | | @ cyberspace.org
 \__, |\__,_|_|_| "Geekdom is fantastic at being AGAINST something, and
 |___/             it's hopeless at being FOR something."
                                      -- Andrew Orlowski in The Register.