Briefly stated, a hydrogen-oxygen reaction will never release more energy that it took to release the hydrogen in the first place. In effect, the hydrogen is a way of storing energy. If you have a cheap source of electrical energy (say, a nuclear power plant) you can use the electricty to seperate the hydrogen, and then the hydrogen to power a vehicle, but what you doing is effectively powering the vehicle with the nuclear power plant, and adding an overhead for the conversion. The kicker is whether electricity is cheap enough to make this process (plus the infrastructure outlay) feasible, and for that we’d need a lot more nukes. (Which is a good idea in any case.)
I might be off track, but I always thought that the real potential for “fuel cell” technology is really to make better Storage Devices for Wind or solar Power. Less toxic, easier maintenance, etc.
I never said the hydrogen/oxygen electrolysis process was oxidation (burning).
However for every chemist who says releasing more energy in the form of hydrogen than you put into the reaction is impossible there are thousands of folk out there right now improving their gas mileage through hydrogen generating boosters to their gasoline engines.
I’m not convinced any chemist understands the process of cracking hydrogen comprehensively—and efficiencies can be gained.
Of course we need cheap electrical power as part of the whole energy solution—and nuke plants are a part of that.
All I’m saying is that in principle, since water is a storage vehicle for energy, it can be tapped too.