Making fuel also makes leftover heat

A hydrogen plant is a heat plant that happens to make fuel. Not all of the electricity becomes hydrogen. A large share shows up as leftover warmth.

An electrolyzer is the machine that splits water into hydrogen fuel with electricity. In the usual industrial kind, it runs hot — hot enough that operators spend money cooling it. That leftover heat used to be a problem to dump.

The tempting mistake is to treat leftover heat as junk. Junk you pay to throw away is still energy.

That is what lets you ask whether the same warmth could make drinking water.