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Chemistry Study sheet 28/10/1013
Chapter 8 / Section 1 Grade : 10 / SAT
Chapter 18 / Section 1 + 2

Chapter 8 – Section 1: Describing Chemical Reactions

Physical indicators of chemical reactions:
Some changes can be observed easily and indicate that a chemical reaction has occurred, these
changes can be used as indications for a chemical reaction, and they are:

1. Evolution of energy as heat and light.

2. Color change.
3. Production of a gas.
4. Formation of precipitate.

Chemical equations must satisfy the law of conservation of mass:

Chemical equation represents (with symbols and formulas), the identities and relative molecular
or molar amounts of the reactants and products in a chemical reaction.

Any chemical equation should fulfil the following requirements:

1) The equation must represent known facts: all reactants and products must be identified.

2) The equation must contain the correct formulas for the reactants and products.

3) The law of conservation of mass must be satisfied: Atoms are neither created nor
destroyed in ordinary chemical reactions, so the same number of atoms of each element
must appear on each side of a correct chemical equation.

Balancing Equations :
To balance equations we need to have the same number of atoms of each element on each side of
a correct chemical equation. In order to achieve that, we add coefficient where necessary.

Coefficient is a small whole number that appears in front of a formula in a chemical equation.

 How to balance an equation ?

- It is done by trial and error. Coefficients are changed and the numbers of atoms are
counted on both sides of the equation.

- When the numbers of each type of atom are the same for both the products and reactants,
the equation is balanced.

- After balancing the equation, we make sure that it is balanced by counting atoms on each
side.

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 - Lets take the procedure step by step:

1- Balance the different atoms one at a time.

2- Start with the atoms of elements that are combined and that appear only once on each
side of the equation.

3- Balance compounds that are composed of more than one atom and appear on both sides
of the equation as single units.

4- Balance H atoms and O atoms after atoms of all other elements have been balanced.

Lets take the following equation as example:

Zn + HCl → ZnCl2 + H2

This equation is not balanced because we have:

1. one chlorine atom on the left and two chlorine atoms on the right.
2. one hydrogen atom on the left and two hydrogen atoms on the right.

So to balance the equation, we start with chlorine, in order to make the number of chlorine atoms
on the right side 2, we add a coefficient of 2 (multiply by 2) and the equation will be:

Zn + 2 HCl → ZnCl2 + H2

The number of chlorine atoms are 2 on both sides.

The number of hydrogen atoms are 2 on both sides.
The number of Zn are 1 on both sides.

So the equation is balanced.

Chapter 18 - Section 1: The Nature of Chemical Equilibrium

All reactions are reversible under certain conditions

Theoretically, every reaction can proceed in two directions, forward and reverse. And so all
chemical reactions can be considered reversible under certain conditions.

Reversible reaction : a chemical reaction in which the products can react to re-form the
reactants.

A reversible chemical reaction is in chemical equilibrium when the rate of its forward reaction
equals the rate of the reverse reaction and the concentrations of its products and reactants remain
unchanged.

Some reactions favor product and other reactants

- In some cases, one of both reactions is favoured over the other.

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 1- When the forward reaction is favoured or so dominant, all reactants will react to form
products, this means that at equilibrium, there is much higher concentration of products
than of reactants.
- In this case we can say that equilibrium "lies to the right".
- Example is the following reaction :

2 SO2 (g) + O2 (g) → 2 SO3 (g)

- Notice that the equation is written showing an inequality of the two arrow lengths.

2- In other cases, reverse reaction is favoured and the amounts of reactants remain high and
the amounts of products are low.
- Here we say that the equilibrium "lies to the right".
- Example is the following reaction :

H2CO3 (aq) + H2O (l) → H3O+ (aq) + HCO3 - (aq)

3- Still in other cases, both forward and reverse reactions occur to nearly the same extent
before chemical equilibrium is established.

In equilibrium, the concentrations of reactants and products remain constant

Suppose two substances, A and B, to form C and D. In turn, C and D react to produce A and B,
and so equilibrium occurs.

This reaction can be represented by the following equation:

nA + mB → xC + yD

- At the beginning of the reaction, the concentrations of C and D are zero, and those of A
and B are maximum.
- Over time, the rate of the forward reaction decreases as A and B are used up.
- Meanwhile, the rate of the reverse reaction increases as C and D are formed.
- When these two reaction rates become equal, equilibrium is established. The individual
concentrations of A, B, C, and D undergo no further changes if conditions remain the
same.

- After equilibrium is attained, the concentrations of products and reactants remain

constant, so a ratio of their concentrations should also remain constant.

- The ratio of the mathematical product [C]x X [D]y to the mathematical product
[A]n X [B]m for this reaction has a definite value at a given temperature. It is the
equilibrium constant of the reaction and is designated by the letter K.

- The following equation describes the equilibrium constant for the above reaction.
- The brackets [ ] indicate the concentration of each substance as expressed in mol/L.
- The superscripts are the coefficients of each substance in the balanced chemical equation.

[C]x [D]y
K= [A]n [B]m

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  Notice that:

- The concentrations of substances on the right side of the chemical equation appear in the
numerator of the ratio, and these substances are the products of the forward reaction.

- The concentrations of substances on the left side of the chemical equation appear in the
denominator of the ratio, and these substances are the products of the forward reaction.

- Each concentration is raised to a power equal to the coefficient of that substance in the
balanced equation.

- The constant K is independent on the initial concentrations. It is dependent on the

temperature of the system.

The equilibrium constant:

- The value of K for a given equilibrium reaction at a given temperature shows the extent
to which the reactants are converted into the products of the reaction.

1- If the value of K is small, it means that the forward reaction occurs only very slightly
before equilibrium is established, and the reactants are favoured, which means the
reverse reaction is favoured.

2- If the value of K is large, it means that the original reactants are largely converted to
products and so the forward reaction is favoured.

- Only the concentration of substances that can actually change are included in K.
- This means that pure solids and liquids are omitted, because their concentrations cannot
change.

- In general, the equilibrium constant K, is the ratio of the mathematical product of the
concentrations of substances formed at equilibrium to the mathematical product of the
concentrations of reacting substances. And each concentration is raised to a power equal
to the coefficient of that substance in the balanced equation.

- The equation for K is referred to as the chemical equilibrium expression.

Check Sample Problem A page 560 of your book to practice how to solve
equations.

Chapter 18 - Section 2: Shifting Equilibrium

Equilibrium shifts to relieve stress on the system

A French chemist, Le Châtelier developed a principle that provides a means of predicting the
influence of stress factors on equilibrium systems.

Le Châtelier principle states that if a system at equilibrium is subjected to a stress, the

equilibrium is shifted in the direction that tends to relieve the stress.

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Examples of stress are:

1- Changes in Pressure

- In order for changes in pressure to affect the system, the total number of moles of gas on
the left side of the equation must be different from the total number of moles of gas on
the right side of the equation.

- Lets take the following equation as example:

N2 (g) + 3H2 (g) → 2 NH3 (g)

- Note that on the left side there is 4 moles of gases (3+1), while on the right side there is 2
moles.

- If we increase the pressure (as the applied stress), the system will shift in a way to reduce
the stress and that will be by decreasing the number of moles.
- To reduce the number of moles the reaction will shift to the direction where there is less
number of moles (here it will be the right side) .

2- Changes in Concentration

- An increase in the concentration of a reactant is a stress on the equilibrium system.

- Lets take the following reaction as an example:

A + B → C + D

- An increase in the concentration of A creates a stress. To relieve the stress, some of the
added A reacts with B to form C and D. And the same applies if we increase the
concentration B. This means that an increase in the concentration of reactants will shift
the reaction to the right.

- On the other hand, if we increase the concentration of C and D will shift the equilibrium
the left.

- A decrease in the concentration of C or D has the same effect as does the increase in the
concentration of A or B, the equilibrium will shift to the right.

- Changes in concentration have no effect on the value of K.

- Many chemical processes involve heterogenous reactions in which reactants or products

are in different phases.

- The concentrations of pure solids and liquids do not change, and by convention are not
written in the equilibrium espression.

- Lets take the following reaction as an example:

CaCO3 (s) → CaO (s) + CO2 (g)

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 - The products are a solid and a gas. Because both CaCO3 and CaO are solids, they are not
in the equilibrium constant expression and so the expression for K will be:

K = [CO2]

3- Changes in Temperature

- Reversible reactions are exothermic in one direction and endothermic in the other.
- Increasing the temperature is in fact addition of energy in the form of heat.

- According to Le Châtelier principle, the stress of the added heat will be lowered by
shifting the equilibrium in the direction that removes heat (lower temperature).

- This means that energy must be absorbed so the reaction that is endothermic occurs until
a new equilibrium is established.

- Likewise, the removal of energy (or decreasing temperature) causes the exothermic
reaction to take place.

Some ionic reactions seem to go to completion

This means that some reaction in certain cases will not be reversible, they will go on the forward
direction until all the products are consumed. Example of cases where this occurs are:

1- Formation of a Gas

2- Formation of a Precipitate

3- Formation of slightly ionized Product

Study well.... 
Miss Maha Tomar

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