Posted on 09/09/2007 7:53:44 AM PDT by grundle
For obvious reasons, scientists long have thought that salt water couldn't be burned.
So when an Erie man announced he'd ignited salt water with the radio-frequency generator he'd invented, some thought it a was a hoax.
John Kanzius, a Washington County native, tried to desalinate seawater with a generator he developed to treat cancer, and it caused 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 chemist, held a demonstration last week at the university's Materials Research Laboratory in State College, to confirm what he'd witnessed weeks before in an Erie lab.
"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.
Dr. Roy said the salt water isn't burning per se, despite appearances. The radio frequency actually weakens bonds holding together the constituents of salt water -- sodium chloride, hydrogen and oxygen -- and releases the hydrogen, which, once ignited, burns continuously when exposed to the RF energy field. Mr. Kanzius said an independent source measured the flame's temperature, which exceeds 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit, reflecting an enormous energy output.
As such, Dr. Roy, a founding member of the Materials Research Laboratory and expert in water structure, said Mr. Kanzius' discovery represents "the most remarkable in water science in 100 years."
But researching its potential will take time and money, he said. One immediate question is energy efficiency: The energy the RF generator uses vs. the energy output from burning hydrogen.
(Excerpt) Read more at post-gazette.com ...
But what about the poor great whites?!?
> ... an independent source measured the flame’s
> temperature, which exceeds 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit,
> reflecting an enormous energy output.
The energy released in recombination is the same as
it normally takes to uncouple the H2 and O, unless
he’s invented a new type of catalytic divorce-omatic.
The lack of insight regarding “over unity” from this
inventor suggests he’s got no handle whatever on how
much RF energy he’s dumping into the water.
Utter gibberish.
Please count me among them.
Not this sh*t again...
If you put electricity through salt water, it breaks apart the bonds between hydrogen and oxygen. Any junior high science student knows that (but obviously not journalists).
The problem is that it takes more energy to break those bonds than the resulting gasses are able to product when burned.
Even if that problem is overcome, there are huge problems with the storage and transportation of those gasses. As it turns out, the stuff leaks right through metals, making them brittle in the process. And, you can imagine that the same problem affect the motors as well.
The story is working its way down the food chain. When it gets to India Times it will finally be done.
What's the frequency, Kenneth?
Understand but it does open up a possible avenue of research... say nuke powered hydrogen generation.
Please explain: Is the sentence gramatically incorrect? Is the explanation of the concept incorrect? Or are you saying that the experiment is a hoax?
“What’s the frequency, Kenneth?”
Show me the math on the energy in versus the energy out.
Petroleum is not an energy source — it is an energy storage container. The energy contained in those products tend to be greater than the energy that was used to get it into the fuel tank, mostly because that energy was put in there by God (nature, etc).
Conversely, I don’t know of any means where energy is naturally stored in water, and therefore, any use of water as an energy storage medium will, at best, release only as much as it took to get it into the tank, and probably, a lot less.
“Please explain: Is the sentence gramatically incorrect? Is the explanation of the concept incorrect? Or are you saying that the experiment is a hoax?”
The actual process is well-known, with various governments having done extensive research on using salt water as fuel during wartime. Any chem student, even at a junior high level, can explain the process for you.
The inventor claims that he’s found a way to make water burnable in a way where the net energy output is greater than the energy required to get it to that state. That’s the part that I don’t believe, and the part where the article gets fuzzy.
The hype is a hoax, designed to get funding for a university.
I guess the Penn State chemist who specializes in these matters referring to this discovery as, “the most remarkable in water science in 100 years” didn’t pass his junior high science class.
Why are Freepers such cynics and know-it-alls?
Maybe nothing will come of it. It still is an interesting discovery.
The only question that matters is how much energy is used in this process, and how much energy is liberated from the salt water. If you get more out of it than you put in, it’s good.
“I guess the Penn State chemist who specializes in these matters referring to this discovery as, “the most remarkable in water science in 100 years” didn’t pass his junior high science class.”
That’s why I say he’s doing a hoax to get funding for Penn State. He’s got to know the challenges. I’ll believe his pronouncements when I see them published in a good proper scientific journal.
We’re “cynical” because we apply critical thought processes to ideas presented to us. You know, thinking, like I was taught to do by a couple of great professors?
It isn’t an “interesting discovery.” This was “discovered” back when electricity was first put through water.
Lastly, we’re “cynical” about ethanol too — another great boondoggle that will take us nowhere closer to being able to flip the bird to the oil tyrants of the world.
You hit the nail on the head.... most of this discoveries are energy, not an energy source (container).
I have this discussion with the green crowd at work. They want electric cars and buses to end the strangle hold oil has on us. But when I ask them how will they produce all the electricity in the quantity needed they fall silent. There are a lot of interesting things on a small scale but when applied to large scale usage they fall apart.
That’s “eerie!”
Despite the decline in quality of original research in recent years, you will not have to worry about that.
These stories really do seem to come up every New Moon...(Looking at calender).
I still remember the absurd quackery in the '70's when we had the so-called Energy Crisis.
I understand that people my dismiss me for being bitter, as I am still awaiting delivery of my "Water into Gasoline Pills" from J.C. Whitney that I ordered decades ago.
“They want electric cars and buses to end the strangle hold oil has on us. But when I ask them how will they produce all the electricity in the quantity needed they fall silent. There are a lot of interesting things on a small scale but when applied to large scale usage they fall apart.”
The last I heard, in order to recharge car batteries in a reasonable amount of time (1 hour?) you’d have to empty an entire power grid to recharge a few cars.
Worse yet, no one talks about the eco problems when you have massive heavy metal mines in places like China, with the corresponding smelting factories in places that don’t care about the environment.
They don’t want to talk about the whole issue of disposal of such batteries.
They don’t want to talk about the problems associated with making cars that will probably only last as long as the batteries, instead of cars that run 300k miles (diesel).
And, they don’t want to talk about the safety issues of a person being involved in an accident when there are 500 pounds of batteries involved.
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