The complete combustion of 1 mole of pentane, C_5H_12, will require how many moles of oxygen, O_2?
1 Answer
Explanation:
We're asked to find the number of moles of
To do this, we first need to write the chemical equation for this reaction, following the general formula for a hydrocarbon combustion reaction:
"hydrocarbon"color(white)(l) + "oxygen" rarr "carbon dioxide" + "water (vapor)"
So
"C"_5"H"_12(l) + "O"_2(g) rarr "CO"_2(g) + "H"_2"O"(g)" " (unbalanced)
Let's now balance this equation. We'll first put a "
"C"_5"H"_12(l) + "O"_2(g) rarr 5"CO"_2(g) + "H"_2"O"(g)" " (unbalanced)
Now we'll put a "
"C"_5"H"_12(l) + "O"_2(g) rarr 5"CO"_2(g) + 6"H"_2"O"(g)" " (unbalanced)
We now have
ul("C"_5"H"_12(l) + 8"O"_2(g) rarr 5"CO"_2(g) + 6"H"_2"O"(g)
Now, we can realize that the stoichiometric ratio of pentane to oxygen is
Therefore, in order to completely combust