Tom Ring wrote:

Mr Higgins is correct, it is scary what people will believe, even when
something obvious is mentioned, like "conservation of energy".

I'd like to know what possible "final chemical energy states" might
exist here. What miracles occurred to release more energy from the
hydrogen? Combining with chlorine? Maybe, but where did the energy to
free the chlorine come from? None of the combinations will release more
than it took to free the elements from the compounds.

I'd love to find out that I'm wrong, though.

Wow, go away for a few days, and everyone is peein' in the pool!

Di-Hydrogen Oxide is, as the name suggests, "already burnt". Or call it
oxidized if you wish.

The gullible know just enough to make an almost intelligent assumption
- "Well Hydrogen is really flammable - Look at what happened to the
Hindenburg! - disregarding that what they were watching burn was the
incredibly flammable fabric coating, and because there is a good chance
that the red insensitive film emulsions of the day would have a hard
time seeing that hydrogen flame. But I digress.

And Oxygen! That stuff is pretty good at making things burn! By golly,
release those, and we have a world full of fuel for the family Escalade!
Fuel will be too cheap to meter!

But sorry sports fans, it did indeed oxidize, and a long time ago at
that. So well burnt that it does a fair job of putting out most fires.

Electrolyzing is after a fashion un-oxidizing it. That will almost
certainly take more energy than whatever is produced. I have to say
almost certainly because there is always the chance that a singularity
will pop up here in the newsgroup and start spitting out refrigerators.
But almost certainly not...

Pure water is hard to electrolyze, and adding chemicals like salt to
enhance the conductivity produces some nasty additional chemistry. Like
that Cl. Wonder what that will make with the H?


There are some dum idees in da world. This one qualifies.

I hate to disappoint you Tom, but you are *not* wrong. 8^)

- 73 de Mike KB3EIA -