One further thought wrt the point that: The usefulness of the Kanzius technique will depend on how efficient the process is, when comparing P-in (elec) to P-out (thermal). One report which seems to have been accurate several weeks ago pegged the initial efficiency (before the famous Dr. Roy got involved in the project) at about 40% which is only about one-half of what you get with DC electrolysis.
OK- there is a way that this invention could be boot-strapped into a useful hybrid for grid independence, even with a lower efficiency than DC electrolysis- or especially for dual use in third world countries for combined power and pure water. Even if the process is less efficient than normal electrolysis, if it can bypass the need for expensive silicon solar arrays, then it can be made more attractive. Commercial solar cells are about 15% or less efficient on average at midday, but the cost of even the cheapest is prohibitive for most uses when ROI is taken into account. The rumors of cheaper solar arrays are reminiscent of the rumors of hot fusion energy - IOW: they are rumor only, and with a final "installed cost" which is always going to be unrelated (usually a multiple of 4-8 times greater than the prior promises and press releases). Any significant advance in the net efficiency of going from free solar energy to a storable fuel like hydrogen, while bypassing solar cells, would be of great value; and one possible advance is this: instead of first converting light into DC electricity - the alternative and better way is to "shift" the photons directly into RF. But is that feasible? The process is known generically as photonic "down-shifting" of frequency. It has been demonstrated to some degree already, with sunlight, so it is feasible but has not received anywhere near the attention it deserves. Downshifting of solar (mixed light frequencies) would be easier to pull-off, and more efficient if many resultant wavelengths in the RF output can be tolerated. It can be more efficient when they are relatively closer (i.e. sunlight vis-a-vis the target wl), but that is not the case when attempting to go from light all the way down to RF in the low MHz range. If the Kanzius technique were to work with microwaves of mixed frequency, possibly in a super-radiance regime, then it would be easier to adapt to solar input. This is doable! For instance, a quick googling turns up: Anovel photonic frequency down-shifting technique formillimeter-wave-band radio-over-fiber (RoF) systems, which has been proposed andverified by simulation. [that does not mean that it works in practice however]. The frequency shifting is based on subcarriermodulation (SCM). "An optical carrier with a subcarrier is injected intothe frequency shifter consisting of a Mach-Zehnder modulator (MZM) orelectroabsorption modulator (EAM) driven by a radio frequencysinusoidal signal. The frequency-shifted optical carrier with afrequency-shifted subcarrier is, thus, generated by SCM modulation." That sounds more complicate than it really is- but is illustrative of the distinct possibility that there exists now a number of routes to go directly from sunlight to mixed RF to hydrogen, but without using silicon (in order to go to DC first). Another related way is the "solar pumped maser." This idea has received attention for use in space, but there are ways to do it in smaller devices. The result could be as simple as using a mirrored trough to focus a sunlight onto a plasma tube, which is pumped by the solar input and which can be tuned by using the very same kind of subcarrier modulation, which has been proposed for RoF usage. Again, this would work best at microwave frequencies. The key to this may be in adapting DPSR (Dicke Preparata Super-Radiance) techniques to solar input. Of course, there is an almost daily report of other ways to go from solar to hydrogen- and ANY of them IMHO are probably superior to silicon, in terms of "bang-for-the-buck". Personally, I find it painful to see so much of the R&D budget going into silicon solar cells- simply because of the similarity of manufacturing to that which is used in IC (integrated circuits). Part of the problem there is that VC (venture capital) is geared to this industry and has no problem with the cross-over, even if it is unwise on the bottom line. ... all of which, to this observer, and when looking at all the variables including the most important of all: the *storability* of a manufacture fuel, seems to indicate that the silicon solar cell industry is an even bigger drain of limited financial resources than is hot fusion. Jones
