# What's going on with "fire from saltwater"? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 3, 2007, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-going-on-with-fire-from-saltwater/406542 "2007-06-03T02:11:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Brainiac4](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/brainiac4/32/3534_2.png) [@Brainiac4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brainiac4)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2007, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-going-on-with-fire-from-saltwater/406542/1 "2007-06-03T02:11:20Z")
Got this sent to me recently. It looks interesting, but it smacks of free energy hooey. [http://www.videosift.com/video/Saltwater-into-fire](http://www.videosift.com/video/Saltwater-into-fire) The gist is that a retired TV station owner, searching for way to cure cancer came up with a radio frequency generator that can “separate water into hydrogen and oxygen” and that a test tube of saltwater (why saltwater? regular water won’t work?) will sustain a 1500 degree flame while in the beam of the device. I found this brief discussion on Physics Forums, which doesn’t shed much light on the subject, apart from pointing out that there’s likely more energy going in than coming out (no surprise there). > **[Unusual Salt-Water Reaction?](https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/unusual-salt-water-reaction.172018/#post-1345601)** > > http://www.wpbf.com/news/13383827/detail.html > > The gist is like this: radiowaves are used to heat up saltwater, making it up to 3000F. Speculation exists over the energy usefulness of this. > > Whats the opinion here on it? I'm no chemist, so its all... Anyone out there have the Straight Dope on this? - b4 ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2007, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-going-on-with-fire-from-saltwater/406542/2 "2007-06-03T02:27:22Z")
[QUOTE=Brainiac4] Anyone out there have the Straight Dope on this? [/QUOTE] The straight dope is, the radio transmitter consumes more energy than is liberated from the saltwater, if that in fact is what is happening. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2007, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-going-on-with-fire-from-saltwater/406542/3 "2007-06-03T02:32:14Z")
As an aside, [electrolyis of salt water](http://science.jrank.org/pages/2351/Electrolysis-Production-sodium-hydroxide-chlorine-hydrogen.html) produces chlorine, hydrogen and sodium hydroxide, so without added oxygen it won’t explode. ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2007, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-going-on-with-fire-from-saltwater/406542/4 "2007-06-03T03:30:51Z")
[Fla. Man Invents Machine To Turn Water Into Fire](http://www.wpbf.com/news/13383827/detail.html) > [@](#): > > Kanzius said the flame created from his machine reaches a temperature of around 3,000 degrees Farenheit. [On the Thermodynamics of Fuel Synthesis](http://209.85.165.104/search?q=cache:SMt3XhoETZMJ:berrygroup.uchicago.edu/papers/235.Warner%2787JPC2216.pdf+%22split+water%22+h2+o2+gibbs&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=6&gl=us&client=firefox-a) > [@](#): > > Several research groups have built small-scale solar reactors for hydrogen production by one-step water decomposition at high temperature. At 2500°K water is split to 4% mole fraction of H[sub]2[/sub]. The entropy of reaction… 2500°K is 4040°F, so unless the reported temp is wrong, Kanzius is getting less than 4% H[sub]2[/sub] at equilibrium. Still 3,000 F is hot enough so you’d expect _some_ water to split. How much is some? Well his flame looks like something you might get from, say a 60 ml/min source of H[sub]2[/sub] (STP etc…) That’s 0.0027 moles of H[sub]2[/sub] per minute. At 18ml/mol for water that represents a dissociation rate of 0.049ml of water per minute From a ~10 ml test tube, that’s not very much. I’m not seeing anything here that can be explained by _localized_ heating within the test tube. It’s got to be localized though, because the water in the tube hasn’t shot out the end, boiling hot.