Salt Water as Fuel

[joepole]

>Gasoline doesn't accomplish this, yet we're still using it.

Yes, it does. It takes less energy to extract, transport, refine, and ignite gasoline than is recovered it produces. If it didn't we wouldn't use it. In fact,w e couldn't use it.

The laws of thermodynamics (specifically the second law) tells us that it did require more energy to make the crude oil in the first place, but that energy was provided by the sun millions of years ago, it doesn't cost us anything to utilize it.

Think of it this way, if you can extract X joules of energy from salt water and it takes 2X joules of energy to extract, where will you get the 2X joules from in the first place?

[rhertz]

As joe pointed out, fundamental laws of physics state that energy cannot be created nor distroyed, it can only be transformed from one type into another.

Keep this in mind when you pay your next light bill. You are not paying for energy. You are paying to "borrow" energy, or more specifically to transduce it from one form into another. In a since, it is impossible to "waste energy". Rather you can only transform it into a form that isn't as desirable as the one you are looking for, such as heat emitted from a computer or light bulb.