Hydrogen Energy

I don't know anything about The New Atlantis but this article confirms one of my suspiscions. To extract hydrogen from a source, say water or methane, it takes a greater expenditure of energy than is gained by burning the hydrogen.

The forumla they use for methane is:
7CH₄ + 4O₂ + 10H₂O => 7CO₂ + 4H₂O + 20H₂

In laymans terms, it takes 7 units of methane (CH₄) to produce 20 units of Hydrogen (H₂). Burning the seven units of methane produces 1435 kilocalories of energy. The hydrogen extracted only produces 1320 kilocalories.