Photosenthesis

[golden_guppy]

Picture if you will, a small device about the size of an existing carb. Inside we have a very small chamber with two elctrodes. There is also a high power VUV light projected into the chamber. The DC power suply has 2 ac signals piggybacked onto it, tuned to oscilate both electrodes. There are no chemicals in use here. Just a steady stream of pure water in, and copious amounts of hydroxy gas out.

Now, as pie in the sky as this sounds, i know for a fact that this has been produced in the lab, and that a seven-fold increase in gas production has been achieved. It's no where near OU, as they are having to use high power lasers, but the theory is sound. It would appear that at a certain frequency of VUV, a photon has EXACTLY the same energy as a hydrogen electron. So, bombard water with enough photons, and you effectively supercharge the electrons, and they jump orbit to the next state. In theory, given enough power, you should be able to split water using nothing but light. In practice, the power required is so emense its not going to happen any time soon.

Now, i haven't got much details of the process (my cousin isn't that stoopid, and he wants to keep his job), but i got enough to investigate further. First there's the VUV light. The frequency range of VUV light is such that it gets absorbed in the air, therefore it can only be measured in a vacuum, hence the V in VUV. It will also have problems penetrating water, and it will get absorbed very quickly. So, that means working with a very thin film of water. As for the light source itself, i have not found any lamps that go low enough into the VUV range, so it looks like the only source currently is from laser.

Also worth noting, is that they were using ac power signals to make the anode and cathode oscilate, not the water. I have no idea what material is being used as the elctrodes, but i can assume that there two materials beings used since they were using two ac freqencies.

Anyway, the scary part is that the final aim is for realtime hydrogen prduction to fuel a rocket motor. Now that would be serious hydrogen production. Water powered air transport anyone?

At least its nice to know that big money is being thrown at this research now, so i cant imagine it will be too many years before we start to see it encroaching into the real world in some form.

My cousin actually described it as the 'hydrogen gold rush'. It seems the political tide has turned now and the idea of a hydrogen economy is on the agenda. There's that much money and research being poured into it now, someone is sure to crack it.

Of course, it would be great if we beat them all too it, and come up with a nice simple foolproof process, publish it all, and ruin all their corporate profit forcasts.

[AlaskaStar]