Run your car off salt water

[Telco]

This is still in its infancy but this guy figured out a way to burn salt water. Eventually they might be able to get all energy generation from burning saltwater. Interesting, if they can make it work. Right now, it works in the lab.

[bbgobie]

Haven't read the link yet (at work). But water is already more expensive than gas... Gas is one of the cheapest liquids to buy...

+ rust. + what is the energy capacity of salt water?

[88HF]

that is so AWESOME!!!

[GasSavers_DaX]

Very cool stuff, and a very humble guy.

[Telco]

Not so much, it takes more energy to break the hydrogen/oxygen bond than you get by burning the hydrogen and oxygen. Still, UNIVAC took many rooms in 1960, and couldn't compete with the computer in today's average wristwatch, so while it isn't viable today one day it might be.

Incidentally, water is only more expensive than gasoline if you are buying it by the bottle of Aquafina. For example, this site quotes water as being 4.45 per 1000 gallons. That would be 50 full tanks at 20 gallons a tank, for a cost of about 9 cents per TANK of "fuel". Plus whatever the salt costs.

[88HF]

Or you could just drive to the ocean and fill up. Hurricanes do it.

[landspeed]

I reserve the right to be sceptical at the present time.

I believe that the laws of physics will be broken (because, they are not the 'laws' of physics, merely laws that we have presumed are present!). We will have 'warp drive' one day. We may even have 'free' energy (maybe by turning mass to energy in a more controlled fashion than nuclear power).

But I'm not saying they have been broken just yet.

(But, if I posted that I just got 63.4MPGus for a 49 mile round trip, people on 'normal' car forums would probably say I couldn't do that without breaking the laws of physics!)

P.S. I will wait for the video to download now it is taking ages

[lunarhighway]

i'm wondering how much energy that machines uses and how much it can produce... or in other words if the technology where to power itself, how much water would be needed for a given amount usefull energy.... maybe we'll all have to drive hummers just to be able to carry our fuel around!

i do like the stirling engine however! i think one day it may finally become more popular... afterall most energy forms can easily produce heat, so you could run it of whatever best after oil runs out.

[landspeed]

It does look interesting! I think the next step is to say... How much energy does it take to run the radiofrequency generator? And, are you getting more energy out via the flame, then you are putting into the generator?. If you work out the most efficient radiofrequency generator you could make, does that allow you to 'produce' energy via this flame?.

Some interesting points to note.

(1) The flame is actually burning with the characteristic Sodium colour (like orange sodium streetlamps, and also dropping salt into a gas-cooker flame). This might just be due to the water 'fizzing' at the top however.

(2) More importantly, the closing statements, as it fades out, is 'Looking into making this process more efficient'. What does that mean? That at the moment the RF generator uses more energy than it produces? If so, how do they assume it will end up using less energy than it makes?

[baddog671]

Energy can be made from anything, so this one doesn't surprise me that much. Once I read an article in a legit magazine (cant remember which) about a guy that made a motor that ran off of metal shavings. Kinda ironic I thought...