6 thoughts on “Splitting Water”

1. The link is to the “Journalistic Liars” article…

2. WOW! Is there anything Don Surber can’t do?

   Rand, you might want to check you link.

3. “I wonder how the economics work out.”

   Dismally, you can be sure. But, that won’t stop anyone who wants to believe that abundant energy from the Sun is not just a few technological baby steps away.

4. Combining the PV cells and electrolyzer into a single unit strikes me as pointless. And last I checked, PV electricity has to drop to like $.02/kWh before PV hydrogen becomes competitive with biomass-derived hydrogen, and probably less than $.01/kWh to compete with hydrogen from reforming of cheap natural gas.

5. PV and wind power can store their intermittent output in a useful form by driving the pumps for reverse osmosis systems. The RO units simply stop flowing when the pumps stop, and multiple smaller pumps can be turned on and off to follow the available source power. Storage volume is cheap, and daily output can vary wildly, yet still be useful.

   Of course the real solution to water shortages is to charge farmers a price for water more similar to that for residential use.

   1. Desalinating and pumping water sounds like a plausible use for an intermittent energy source. Match the use to the supply and store the product. Still needs a deeper consideration of the economics, how expensive the supplied water would be.

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