Soda Can Hydrogen Generator for Alternative Energy

Make Hydrogen On Demand from Activated Aluminum and Water.

THIS INVENTION IS NOW PATENT PENDING. It can be reproduced for non-commercial use. Anybody interested in commercializing this invention please contact the author.

I use a drop of liquid metal that I bought from eBay and aluminum from a soda can to produce hydrogen from water.

This reaction solves the problem of hydrogen storage for the hydrogen economy. Energy dense activated aluminum acts as the storage medium, liberating hydrogen on demand when exposed to water.

After the exhaustion of the reaction, the resultant aluminum oxide (alumina) is shipped to a power generator plant that reduces it back to aluminum. Since alumina is a suspension in water it can be delivered via pipelines to the power station.

Liquid metal is available here:

http://www.google.com/products?q=Coollaboratory+Liquid+Pro&hl=en&aq=f

It is usually listed on the internet as

Coollaboratory LiquidPro Fluessigmetall Waermeleitpaste

My other Instructables:
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Hack The Spy Ear and Learn to Reverse Engineer a Circuit
Super Easy E-mail Encryption Using Gmail, Firefox and Windows
Make a Voltage Controlled Resistor and Use It
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Make a Rechargeable Dual Voltage Power Supply for Electronic Projects

Step 1 Prepare the Aluminum

Cut the soda can into strips.
Sand the plastic off a strip.
The finished strip should be clean and shiny.
Proceed swiftly to step 2.

Comments

[ameenkhan]

i need to know where i can find it liquid metal

[Lefrançois]

For the manufacture of "liquid Metal", is here (toner powder + vegetable oil):

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xbz1r9_fabriquer-simplement-du-metal-liqui_tech

[Biotele]

This is not the same thing. But absolutely cool!

[ankit_mait_07]

Hi
I have a small question.
Are there any rechargeable/refillable Hydrogen fuel cells having same power specification and size specs as a AA battery?

regards
bored_guy

[Lefrançois]

oui ici:
(bottom of page)
http://www.horizonfuelcell.com/hobby_rc.htm

[Biotele]

Merci mon ami. Facinant.

[TheGoodLife]

Wouldn't it be cheaper to sail the ship once. During the journey, the ship lays a grid interconnector to the US or UK. Iceland can then distribute its excess power at a lower cost than shipping it.

[Biotele]

No. 80% of the power will be lost transmitting power through cable from iceland to UK/US.

[wilecoyote22]

you have your numbers backwards. 80% of the power would reach the UK/US while 20% (approximate) would be lost to natural resistance in the cable. All of this means nothing though. We are forgeting that charging the batteries will be wasteful as well. No battery has zero resistance. If electric rates are really so cheap then why not just lay a superconducting cable like are used in the US for extreme distance? Sure they are expensive but nothing compared to building and operating a ship at sea. Besides, cables don't sink or crash

[Biotele]

The most ambitious submarine to date is a cable of 450-miles being installed across the South China Sea to carry power from a recently completed 2400MW hydroelectric power dam in Sarawak province to mainland Malaysia. "If electric rates are really so cheap then why not just lay a superconducting cable like are used in the US for extreme distance? " You must be a time traveler from the future, we don't have that yet.

[wilecoyote22]

Ok I admit that I dont "Know" of a superconductive power cable in commercial use exactly. I am assuming since they were doing demonstrations as early as 2007 over several hundred miles that they probably are being used commercially today. http://thefraserdomain.typepad.com/energy/2007/05/next_generation.html

[Biotele]

It will be great to have commercial superconductive cables. They have been working on them for 30 years. When they become commercially viable, they will be a game changer.

I will be careful about company announcements, they are meant to boost investors sentiment. This one was dated 2007. Any updates?

[Jimmy Proton]

another way to make large amounts of hydrogen and oxygen is to put steel into acid in a bottle with a balloon on the top or something

[DRY HHO]

While the idea is interesting the resources from Iceland is not. Currently there are major conflicts over Alcoa trying to industrialize Iceland. We now that industrialization didn't work. The only thing it did was add to how we pollute and destroy the environment. There 200 years too late for industrializing Iceland. Iceland is a place of natural beauty that should not be harvested for profit. Aluminum has great uses for these types of designs... we just need to be aware of where we get it from. These ideas are to protect the earth not pollute it in another fashion.
Dry hho

[alter baron]

It's sad how academics always rush to patent such simple discoveries, especially when the discovery holds a great deal of promise for the future. Patents on processes such as this one do not help to stimulate innovation; rather, the drive to innovate is extinguished because the very roots of that innovation are owned by individuals. Until we can emancipate ourselves from the profit-motive, we may never see a truly green society.

[Biotele]

I am not an academician, I am an inventor. And inventors have the right to make a living. But, Academia and corporations have hijacked the innovation process, because patenting has become too expensive for the lone inventor. The researchers in academia and corporations get little benefits from their inventions.

[thefunktopus]

Regarding the icelandic scheme 1) the US does not have a national grid as such, grids are independent of state so electricity cannot be transferred between them and 2)would it not be better to invest in electricity transimission lines between iceland and the uk. If a high enoughvoltage could be created, it may be viable.

[Biotele]

Yes, this is a viable alternative. but the economics must be calculated. I am not sure how much it will cost. however the EU is planning a supergrid between the middle east, africa and Europe. Iceland fits in that scheme. http://www.desertec.org/en/concept/

[gateon]

Or, you could just use the works to make hydrogen.

[DrStoooopid]

You let it set long enough for the liquid metal to penetrate the aluminium, thus accounting for the violent reaction, as there wasn't a way for their any oxidation to occur, because the liquid metal thoroughly "wetted" the aluminium. You should be able to recover your gallium from that dried up mess on top there, just like normal.

[Biotele]

Have you ever came across a reaction were a metal permeates another metal like it was a sponge? If you look carefully in the second picture, the liquid metals does not wet and spread on the surface, but actually mixes with the aluminum giving a different shine from the original aluminum. Yes the gallium is recoverable after the reaction.

[Kryptonite]

How so?

[DrStoooopid]

that's what true wetting is...the liquid metal soaks into the other metal. That's supposed to happen. It didn't happen before because you didn't let it sit long enough before.

[Biotele]

I am not expert on metal on metal interaction, do you have some papers that describes this phenomena? Personally, I never heard of metal soaking into other metals. I thought wetting process involved the loss of surface tension in the liquid metal because of surface boundary amalgamation.

[Austringer]

The terminology is different, but ask a jeweler about eutectic melting. If you have a drop of a low melting alloy (lead, tin, antimony, etc.) on a piece of sliver or gold and heat it up enough to melt the low melting alloy, it will tend to pull the high melting alloy into solution. This tends to eat big pits (at least at the jewelry scale) into whatever it is that you are working on and cause no end of cursing.

[Biotele]

I am not sure it is the same thing. Did you see the second picture in step 5? There is no hole, the only change is a shine that is different from the surrounding aluminum, and it's that shiny area that is extremely reactive with water.

[merseyless]

just hypothesising here but the mercury might have removed the unreactive aluminium oxide and revealed the aluminium, which does react with water, dont know if it would have reacted that vigorusly though...

[Kryptonite]

Is this "liquid metal" Galinstan?

[fireblast_1212]

(removed by author or community request)

[Biotele]

BTW, I will be very happy if you use it for commercial use. It is a good thing to pay inventors because it promote innovation and inventors make more things for commercialization thus perpetuating the economy. If you don't pay inventors then they won't share their ideas.  Would like to live in a world were no one share ideas and nobody invents?

[Biotele]

This was patented prior to publication, and even if it was not, an inventor has one year after publication to patent according to US law. I am using Instructable as a new way to promote patent ideas.

[Hunter4000695]

I hait to burst your bubl but Iceland can't supply all the world with power. It's not possible.

[macrumpton]

Oh, It's not possible! Why didn't I see that? Seriously if you are going to say something is impossible, at least have some kind of concept behind your assertion, and ideally have some links and figures showing how you have come to this conclusion.

[Hunter4000695]

In 2005 we as a world yoosd 5*10^20j.
Let me give a agsampl of that 1j is a nuf energy to rase 1kg 1m.we could of
raisd 1kg 500000000000000000000m
if it wus in mile it would be 3.106855961e+17mi from erth.
And you think that one countrie could do this?
not taking in to the risk of puting all your eggs in one baskit.

[lofty]

Gravitational potential energy = mgh in a linear gravitational field
At low altitudes, the earth's gravitational field can be modelled by an approximate field strength of 9.81 n/kg

Anyway it would take 9.81J of energy to raise 1kg to a height of 1m

But since you are talking about raising it high enough, you would have to consider the earth's field as a radial field, gets a bit more complicated but here goes.

Work done = mass * (change in gravitational potential)
Gravitational potential = -GM/r
therefore work need to raise 1kg up to 500000000000000000000m

r = radius of earth = 6378100m
G = gravitational constant = 6.67^-11
M = mass of earth = 5.97 * 10^24

Work = 1 * (-GM/(r + 5*10^20) + GM/r)
Work needed = 62MJ (Mega joules)
i.e 62,000,000J

Now i'm sure a power station is able to output that amount of energy very easily as most are in the order of hundreds of mega watts, therefore, it would take less than a second to output the energy needed to raise this 1kg to the height you said, not 5*10^20 J as you said

Go learn some physics, learn how to spell.

[Hunter4000695]

well I made a mistake it's not 1j is a nef energy to raise 1kg 1m
it's, 1 joule is the amount of energy required to exert a force of 1N through a distance of 1 meter. It has bin a fue years sins my high school physics class, but I don't remember having to add gravity to this problem. I thank it includes it

crekt me if this is false.

[Derin]

try to use a spell checker please

[Hunter4000695]

I have dyslexia, so it is hard to spell. And yes I yoos spell check but the ikon is gon on the reply butten!!! :0

[rimar2000]

I'm dyslexic too, and besides I speak Spanish, not English. But I proofread iteratively until the result is understandable (at least I think that).

You have more obligation to make you understand, than we interpret what you write. It's BASIC!

[Hunter4000695]

If you have dyslexia then you understand the frustration in writing a simple coming. I don't have a lot of time to waist on this.