Whether you are an internee at some chemistry lab or a chemistry student working on their assignment, it can be said with near certainty that you deal with a lot of chemical equations.
And, you probably already know how to balance these equations. However, this article is for regular people interested in chemical experiments and those students who want to opt for chemistry as a major.
Intro:
For a little background, a chemical equation is a symbolic characterization of a chemical reaction (The symbols are the letters representing the elements while numbers represent the respective amount of molecules that make up elements).
The reacting chemicals are placed on the left-hand side and the product chemicals on the right-hand side of the chemical equation.
The two are connected with an arrow proceeding from the left side to the right, denoting the reaction.
Nature takes care of the balance by itself, but on paper, the chemist has to balance the chemical equation. If you’re wondering why the chemical equation has to be balanced, we’ve got just the answer for you!
The law of conservation of mass says that no atoms can be created or destroyed in a chemical reaction. This is why the number of atoms that are in the reactant chemicals has to balance the number of atoms that are in the product chemicals. It is wise to calculate percentage yield first.
Moving on, we’d be discussing how you can balance chemical equations with distinct steps.
First, classify each element in the formula.
Make corrections for the net charge on both sides of the equation. It must be the same on each side.
If possible, begin with the chemical element found in one compound on each side of the equation. Then proceed to alter the coefficients (the numbers in front of the compound or molecule) so that the number of atoms of the element is the same on both sides. Bear in mind however that to balance an equation, you alter the coefficients, not the subscripts in the equations.
Once you have balanced an element, repeat the same process with other elements until the equation is balanced. It’s simpler to leave elements found in pure form to balanced last.
Check the whole process to make sure the charge on both parts of the formula is also in equilibrium.
A Working Example
CH4 + O2 → CO2 + H2O
Classify the chemicals in the formula: C, H, O
Check the net charge: it doesn’t have a charge, on the plus side, it would be simpler to work out.
H (hydrogen) is found in CH4 (methane) and H2O (water), so it’s a good starting chemical.
We have 4 Hydrogen atoms of methane (CH4) while only 2 Hydrogen atoms in water (H2O) so what we need to do is double the coefficient of a water molecule.
When it comes to carbon, you can see that CH4 and CO2 must have the same coefficient.1 CH4 + O2 → 1 CO2 + 2 H2O
Lastly, what we need to do is gauge the O coefficient. For this purpose, we need to double the O2 coefficient to obtain 4 O on the product side of the reaction. 1 CH4 + 2 O2 → 1 CO2 + 2 H2O
After all, is done, drop the coefficient of 1 as it is a standard. Finally, your equation would look like as we’ve shown below:
CH4 + 2 O2 → CO2 + 2 H2O
In case you’re interested only in the fun part of the experiment i.e. practical chemical reaction and find all this balancing stuff theoretically on paper annoying, you can use a balance equation calculator.
These types of balancers would do all the theoretical work for you while you have fun in your backyard blowing stuff up.
