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Home>blogs>energy from water not so far fetched as you might think...
  • Energy from water? Not so far fetched as you might think...

    Mike published on January 14, 1970

    http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2007/09/pennsylvania-ma.html Pennsylvania Man Claims He Made Fuel From Salt Water By Kristen Philipkoski September 10, 2007 | 5:54:34 PM This sounds a wee bit nutty, but an article in Sunday's Pittsburgh Post-Gazette tells the story of an Erie, Pennsylvania man who created a 3,000-degree flame by exposing salt water to radio frequencies. The guy, according to the story, was trying to desalinate seawater with a generator "he developed to treat cancer," when he noticed a flash in the test tube. Within days, he had the salt water in the test tube burning like a candle, as long as it was exposed to radio frequencies. His discovery has spawned scientific interest in using the world's most abundant substance as clean fuel, among other uses. Rustum Roy, a Penn State University (my alma mater!) chemist and expert in water structure, tells the Post-Gazette the guy is not just a nut bar. He says he recreated the phenomenon last week at the university's Materials Research Laboratory in State College. "It's true, it works," Dr. Roy said. "Everyone told me, 'Rustum, don't be fooled. He put electrodes in there.' " But there are no electrodes and no gimmicks, he said. Roy called Kanzius' discovery "the most remarkable in water science in 100 years." I can't wait to see whether other researchers can replicate these results. If they could, it would blow away results cold fusion experiments have seen in terms of the amount of energy generated.

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      • Photo of Jeff

        Energy in vs Energy out

        Jeff published on September 12, 2007

        This is definatly nifty. The idea is cool but you have to be careful. The water does become a fuel, but it needs constant excitation of the radio waves to make it work. I'm sure that these radio waves are very strong and it probably takes a lot of power to create them. This system will only be useful if the useable energy produced is larger than the amount of energy it takes to run the radio signal. Someone needs to do the energy balance calcs.

      • Photo of Mark

        More

        Mark published on September 12, 2007

        Jeff's observation is supported by this link. It says that

        While the phenomenon is interesting, it is not yet practical for energy generation. More energy is consumed by the radio frequency device than is produced for burning. Efficiency-wise, they are presently at around 76 percent of Faraday's theoretical limit.

      • Photo of Therese

        Very Good, Guys.

        Therese published on September 18, 2007

        Love your thought processes. Interesting subject.

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