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A couple of points here. First, brakes may be able to absorb hundreds of horsepower in a panic stop, but usually one does not brake quite so drastically. With the normal (MIMA-controlled) regenerative braking on my Insight, I'm able to keep downhill speeds in a reasonable range on a 6-7% downgrade without touching the normal brakes, at least until the IMA battery is fully charged. And I frequently descend 4500 vertical feet of such grades.
Second, it would seem inefficent to use the regen to charge a battery to later produce hydrogen by electrolysis. I don't think electrolysis is rate-limited (though I'm not a chemist). So you might have a reaction vessel of water supplied by a high-pressure pump. Braking electricity electrolyzes the water into H2 and O2 under pressure (the vessel should be separated into H2 and O2 compartments), and a bleeder valve slowly releases them into your intake on demand.
You know, this might actually work. At the very least, it's consistent with conservation of energy :-)
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