Understanding High School Chemistry Can Help You Spot BS

The meme here is total BS.  How do I know?

CO₂  is one of the products (stuff on the right side of the arrow) in CH₄ + O₂ -> CO₂ + H₂O + energy, the combustion of methane, which is what happens on your gas stovetop.   You get energy out of this process, in order to, say, boil water to make tea, which means you’re going to have to add energy if you want to have any chance of reversing it.

Coincidentally, a lady asked me just yesterday if, in our lifetimes, we’ll be able to use water as a fuel for cars.  I said no, not in ours nor in anyone else’s lifetime, because water is a chemical that is the product of hydrogen coming into contact with oxygen.

This is what happens in a hydrogen fuel cell: you use energy to separate the hydrogen from the oxygen in water in a process called electrolysis.  Then, the hydrogen atoms want to join the oxygen atoms to make water, so the hydrogen atoms spit out their electrons, which go through an electrical circuit, doing work of some kind, e.g. powering a car.   The product is water, which drips out of the back of the car.

Think of fireplace logs and the ashes they leave.  You burn logs, which contain chemical energy to, say, warm your home.  You can’t burn ashes, since the energy has already been removed from them.