There is this thing water and salt have in common, both are the children of terrible parents. Let's start with salt, the everyday salt we put in our food. Sodium is a metal and would react violently when in contact with water, the reaction is not friendly so beware. While chlorine can help bleach your clothes, in its gaseous form, this yellowish-green gas is highly toxic. However, when sodium and chlorine; two wild elements, come together, it creates the innocent common salt we all use to season our food.

In the case of Water, imagine a firefighter whose parents are notorious arsonists. When hydrogen gets married to oxygen, their child is water. It's a polygamous relationship because hydrogen takes up two oxygen atoms. But before the union, oxygen alone supports burning while hydrogen on its own will not only burn, it explodes with a pop or a boom, but their union creates water, a substance that turns off fires.

Chemistry can be funny with a lot of ironic twists.. as if chemistry has some kind of sense of humour.

My Aim

It is on this premise that I base my hope. Though it may sound like the words of a home wrecker. I am planning a situation that will lead to a breakup. I want hydrogen to divorce his wives.

My Plan

Introduce electricity as a force that will cause separation, break and decompose H₂O , separating the H from the O.

Electrolysis is a chemical process where electricity is used to split a compound into its elements. For water, it separates into hydrogen at the cathode and oxygen at the anode. It’s like using power to force a “breakup” of molecules.

The Setup.

I need only a few basic things to execute this plan. A container with tap water, two electrodes which I prefer using graphite from an old dry cell battery. I will need a power source like a battery.

Once I connect the electrodes to the battery, and electricity flows through the water, it is expected to break H₂O molecules into hydrogen gas at the negative side and oxygen gas at the positive electrode. The freed gas is expected to escape as visible bubbles forming at both electrodes.

I would have loved to assist its efficiency by adding some salt to the water, but I fear the salt could also be broken into sodium and chlorine gas which is toxic. I will have to collect the released hydrogen gas, another challenge I will have to surmount.

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*Conclusion and Invitation

I would really love to try extracting hydrogen from water and if this works I would move to the next level which is powering a modified gas generator with the hydrogen.

I am inviting @nella19, @rubee2as1, @jerardid20 @onyii03, @emerson-25, @axgustine, @lauren0802, @goodnews2020 and @mayjay to contribute and have a say on this topic.

Media Credit

Composer	@manuelhooks
Pictures	Galaxy-A15
Entry type	Freelance
Date	Wed. 25th Feb
	(@) 2026