Possible Energy Source: Burning Seawater

(AP)  An Erie cancer researcher has found a way to burn salt water, a novel invention that is being touted by one chemist as the "most remarkable" water science discovery in a century.

John Kanzius happened upon the discovery accidentally when he tried to desalinate seawater with a radio-frequency generator he developed to treat cancer. He discovered that as long as the salt water was exposed to the radio frequencies it would burn.

The discovery has scientists excited by the prospect of using salt water, the most abundant resource on earth, as a fuel.

Rustum Roy, a Penn State University chemist, has held demonstrations at his State College lab to confirm his own observations.

The radio frequencies act to weaken the bonds between the elements that make up salt water, releasing the hydrogen, Roy said. Once ignited, the hydrogen will burn as long as it is exposed to the frequencies, he said.

The discovery is "the most remarkable in water science in 100 years," Roy said.

"This is the most abundant element in the world. It is everywhere," Roy said. "Seeing it burn gives me the chills."

Roy will meet this week with officials from the Department of Energy and the Department of Defense to try to obtain research funding.

The scientists want to find out whether the energy output from the burning hydrogen - which reached a heat of more than 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit - would be enough to power a car or other heavy machinery.

"We will get our ideas together and check this out and see where it leads," Roy said. "The potential is huge."

[DavidFMayerPhD]

It is not possible. It violates Thermodynamics. It is crap. No, I don't have to see it fail. I am not interested in a demonstration any more than I want to see pictures of "real-live fairies".

Each year some other idiot comes up with another perpetual motion machine, a way to burn water in cars, a battery that never needs recharging, ....

Not one of them has ever actually worked and none ever will.

You should refrain from running idiotic stories such as this one. Get some proper scientific advice before making fools of yourselves.

[seeingisbelieving]

Aren't we just borrowing the energy to do work?

[altenergy1]

Thanks, this is a great news story. We need more news stories on alternative energy research. There are new discoveries going on in all directions but we seldom get to know of their work in progress. We need a variety of fuel sources instead of all our "eggs in one basket" on one planet. There is never more energy taken out than is put in to any type of fuel. There is certainly more sea water than oil on this planet unless it is renewing its self. We should be looking at everything in some new kind of way and use the tools and knowledge provided by previous researchers to assist our work. Surrender to enthropy should not be a chosen option. If all the forces,(money, energy, beliefs) that went into the destruction of our world was focused on constructing a more safe, healthful, and tolerent life style our energy problems would have more than already been solved.

[Syndicate]

I''m skeptical. I think the energy from the radio waves is feeding the system. The radio waves are pumping energy into the bond between the hydrogen and the oxygen atoms. When the energy is enough the bond will break and the atoms will seperate. Use a flame to reverse the process and rebond the atoms. once the atoms bond the stored energy is released. I think your net energy gain is probably negative.

[hugbee]

He should talk to the guy who produced cold fusion using sound waves. I think they have a lot in common.

[gorph001]

I''ll believe it when I see it, "safe" energy from somehow converting "seawater"...what are the by-products of this?, how efficient could this be?...Does it take more energy in to produce energy out?...is that efficient, or usefull?

[octavianfdlr]

eggy1620, the last time that I suggested that anthropogenic greenhouse gases might not be responsible for global warming, I was labeled a tool of Exxon-Mobil. When I objected that there had not been time for Exxon-Mobil to construct the data I was accessing, I was accused of defending Exxon-Mobil for their misdeeds during WWII. Questioning the Gospel of Global Warming has also gotten me accused of promoting the dumping of millions of billions of tons of carcinogens into the atmosphere.

You ask "has no one...?" Many of us have. But the suggestion is not politically correct. Neither are the observations that sea level was close to 5 meters higher than now, a mere 115 thousand years ago, and that there were no SUVs or coal powered generating stations back then. Nor even Exxon-Mobil!

[eggy1620]

To all the thermodynamisists here, has no one considered the possibility that alternative energy sources will not make a dent in global warming? Energy can neither be created nor destroyed, just transferred from one form to another. I posit that releasing CO2 into the atmosphere has nothing to do with global warming. The increasing use of stored energy from the earth for the last several centuries has resulted in the transfer of that energy from chemical form to heat. As long as we continue using ANY form of energy, that energy will ultimately wind up as heat, which cannot be destroyed, and will continue heating the globe.

[octavianfdlr]

Why retract the story? Why print it? Better yet, put it under "odd" together with the story about the progress in finding the person who assassinated President Clinton back in 1998!

I wish that the name actornaught gave me (Captain Obvious) were even slightly appropriate. Unfortunately, there seem to be many people (in addition to the reporter and at least two editors) who are ready to believe that sea water might be a fuel whose chemical energy can be released by microwave irradiation.

There are far more posts to this article by Major Credulous than by Captain Obvious!

[pepperwood2]

Somebody correct me if I''m wrong but I believe that we are now using Hydrogen to power our cars.

A few month ago I read an account of a person in California that was quite proud of the fact that their new automobile was powered from a tank of liquified hydrogen at 4000 or more psi and about 300 to 400 degrees below 0, all located in the truck of their car.

Unfortunately while it was parked in their garage underneath their home it was setting off the homes hydrogen detectors. Tank was breaking apart!

Solution - Park it in the street & increase home owners coverage. Nothing like sitting on a Hydrogen Bomb.