Partially Hydrogenated

I made some hydrogen last night...well, I didn't create it or anything...I just liberated it from a glass of water. The exotic equipment I used consisted of two #2 pencils, two wires, a 9 volt battery, and, of course, a glass of water. I strung it all together until hydrogen bubbles formed, and went to bed. In the morning, I still had plenty of water left - a nine volt won't drown you in hydrogen - but I reminded myself how simple it is. For those who don't know already, water is 2 parts hydrogen and one part oxygen. To get at the hydrogen, plug a DC current into water and hydrogen collects at one electrode and oxygen at the other. Pretty easy, but if you want to make a lot of it, consider joining the battery club at Radio Shack.

Hydrogen's been on my mind lately, because there has been so much talk about the hydrogen economy and, in particular, fuel cells powering our cars. Fuel cells take hydrogen, which is made with electricity and water and turn it back into electricity, and water. This may seem to be a rather pointless exercise, until you realize that hydrogen is very good at storing electricity, something windmills, solar panels, fusion reactors, and coal fired power plants are all very bad at. Lost in all the fuel cell fervor is that you can also burn hydrogen. Now maybe its just because I'm an American, and hydrogen's a flammable gas, and nobody burns stuff better than the good ole USA. Or, maybe it's because making a hydrogen engine isn't much, if any harder than making a gasoline engine. But, Instead of just turning our hard to make hydrogen back into electricity, let's make something else with it...like heat, expanding gases, and "vroom vroom" horsepower?I say, skip the fuel cell and just put a hydrogen eight cylinder in my SUV

Now, I like fuel cells, and the argument in favor of them is their high efficiency. It's sort of like this - We can increase a horse's efficiency if we turn him upside down, tie magnets to his hooves, and have his flailing legs induce a current in this special platinum coil. This argument, while compelling, doesn't mean that, while we're waiting for this breakthrough to hit the market, we shouldn't ride the horse to town the normal way. A hydrogen engine burns just as cleanly as a fuel cell, it just makes a little hot waste water at the tailpipe. I figure we can use that hot water to melt snow, or to clean off the windshield, or make soup...or whatever. It turns out that I don't hate inefficiency, I hate pollution.

Don't get me wrong. I'd love to have a fuel cell humming away in my basement, making heat, electricity, bagels, and whatever else they make. But to put the hydrogen economy on hold until they are workable enough to power our big fat American cars seems crazy. Some people have made the claim that the fuel cell in my new hydro car may produce enough electricity to power my home. That's great, but won't the refrigerator go off every time I drive to the store? Guess I better hurry back. I can just hear my wife "Hon, could you stay home today so I can turn on the lights and vacuum? No? Well, then could you leave the car? Thanks an mil!" Sure, dear, I'll just take the train...if there were any trains.

Still, the real problem is the hydrogen infrastructure. Yeah, I know there's a hydrogen fueling station in Las Vegas. And if I only lived a few thousand miles closer, I could make it there on a tank of gas. And the REAL real problem is that oil makes the electricity that makes the hydrogen that makes the electricity that makes the car zip down to Star bucks. So, no matter what turns the wheels, to make a big difference, we need a commitment to hydrogen production from green energy. Well, I've got a nine volt's worth of hydrogen floating around my house that says I'm ready.