Water is a very poor source for hydrogen. It is also the same as the thought lines of ethanol from corn. Use our food source as an alternative energy. In this case take water and use it for energy.
As in fuel cells, the most abundant useful source for hydrogen is natural gas. It has a lot more hydrogen atoms than that found in water. In fact one of the by products is water.
It will be a very interesting time when our economy is no longer energy based and that economic engine is throttled back to little more than providing lubrication. Imagine all of the refineries that will be shut down, all of the drilling that would cease, all of the gas stations that would no longer be needed, all of the supporting businesses that fuel the engine of the oil companies like machine shops, welders, transportation, and on and on.
As much as you do not like it, there has been one thing and one thing only that has kept this nation from remaining in the 2nd great depression and that is the oil and natural gas on private lands made accessible by the innovations in drilling.
Originally Posted by The2Dogs
Actually, water is an excellent source of hydrogen. In fact, they are proposing using deep seawater because it has higher amounts of deuterium. So there may not even be a choice to use natural gas.
But ultimately, that is a moot point. You only need a very small amount of water (or gas) as a source of hydrogen if you are using fusion. A gallon of water could power New York for a year. The energy density of H20 (using fusion) is millions of time greater than a gallon of gasoline. Fuel is essentially free.
Fusion (if it can be done) will create millions of jobs to offest the ones lost in oil. Every power plant in the country would be converted to fusion. With very cheap, abundant electricity, our fleet of vehicles would shift over to electric even faster.
Very low energy prices (fuel is essentially free for the generators) will also boost US manufacturing. If it can be done, there is essentially no downside.