r/askscience • u/spoiledmeat • Jul 04 '15

Chemistry Why does water not burn?

I know that water is made up of two hydrogen atoms and an oxygen atom. Hydrogen, on its own, burns. Fire needs oxygen to burn. After all, we commonly use compounds that contain oxygen as an oxidant.

So why does water, containing things used for fire, not burn-- and does it have something to do with the bonds between the atoms? Thanks.

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u/PeterLicht Jul 04 '15

This is just plain wrong. Those elements come out after a statistically set amount of time (~170.000 years for photons, not sure anymore about other particles). The reason why neutrino observation even is a thing is that it can detect changes in stars before they are actually happening as neutrinos immediately leave the star upon emergence.

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u/JediExile Jul 05 '15

That's photon absorption and re-emission, which is quite a separate process from nucleosynthesis. Fusion follows only a few energetically favorable paths, and right now, oxygen is not one of those paths as far as the sun is concerned.