[jambutty]

On the face of it there is nothing wrong with wind turbines West Ender except it costs more in materials, manpower and energy to produce and maintain one than the value of the electrical energy that it produces.

Some wag once calculated that it would be some 20 years before you get any positive return from a windmill. What he meant was that taking into account the cost of making one, the energy used to do so and the cost and energy for maintaining it, it would be some 20 years before the windmill starts to make a profit and by then it is coming to the end of its useful life.

A Diesel engine run on bio fuel does not pollute the atmosphere to anywhere near the degree that one run on fossil fuel does Madhatter. Bio fuel is renewable and would give the farmers something to grow instead of leaving fields fallow because growing normal vegetables is rapidly becoming non-cost effective. In any case surely it is not beyond the wit of engineers to produce a bio Diesel engine that is truly clean, except the oil industry will not allow it to happen until they have squeezed the last penny profit out of oil and gas.

On a not too distant TV motoring programme on Channel 5 I think it was, the Japanese (who else) demonstrated a saloon car that ran on water. It was capable of up to 100 mph with a range of some 240 miles. Much like any normal middle of the range saloon car. Actually it ran on hydrogen that was produced from water. The exhaust of this wonder vehicle is water.

Hydrolysis of water is the means of separating the two atoms that go to make up one molecule of fresh water. 2 atoms of hydrogen to one atom of oxygen – H2O

This is achieved by passing a DC current through the water from one metal plate to another immersed in the water. I think that one plate has to be lead and the other zinc. No doubt some budding scientist will correct me there if I’m wrong. The hydrogen bubbles collect on one plate and the oxygen bubbles collect on the other and both are draw off and stored. The hydrogen is then used as fuel to power a car and the oxygen is either dispersed to atmosphere or used where oxygen is needed. Water we have plenty of but generating the electricity to use could present a problem. But that is where solar panels come in. Solar panels only need light to produce electricity and being a DC current they would be ideal to power a hydrolysis plant.

The only viable solution for our electricity needs are hydro electric schemes and solar panels but they both require a lot of land space and we have too many NIMBYS around for that to happen.