HOW TO BALANCE CHEMICAL REACTIONS IN EQUATIONS

When you write an equation for a chemical reaction, the two sides of the equation should balance you

need the same number of each kind of element on both sides. If you carry out a chemical reaction and

carefully sum up the masses of all the reactants, and then compare the sum to the sum of the masses of

all the products, you see that theyre the same.

A law in chemistry, the Law of Conservation of Mass, states, In an ordinary chemical reaction, matter is

neither created nor destroyed. This means that you have neither gained nor lost any atoms during the

reaction. They may be combined differently, but theyre still there.

A chemical equation represents the reaction. That chemical equation is used to calculate how much of

each element is needed and how much of each element will be produced.

One chemical reaction is called the Haber process, a method for preparing ammonia by reacting nitrogen

gas with hydrogen gas:

This equation shows you what happens in the reaction, but it doesnt show you how much of each

element you need to produce the ammonia. To find out how much of each element you need, you have to

balance the equation make sure that the number of atoms on the left side of the equation equals the

number of atoms on the right.

You know the reactants and the product for this reaction, and you cant change them. You cant change

the compounds, and you cant change the subscripts, because that would change the compounds.

So the only thing you can do to balance the equation is add coefficients, whole numbers in front of the

compounds or elements in the equation. Coefficients tell you how many atoms or molecules you have.

For example, if you write the following, it means you have two water molecules:

Each water molecule is composed of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom. So with two water

molecules (represented above), you have a total of 4 hydrogen atoms and 2 oxygen atoms.

You can balance equations by using a method called balancing by inspection. You take each atom in turn

and balance it by adding appropriate coefficients to one side or the other.

With that in mind, take another look at the equation for preparing ammonia:
In most cases, its a good idea to wait until the end to balance hydrogen atoms and oxygen atoms;

balance the other atoms first.

So in this example, you need to balance the nitrogen atoms first. You have 2 nitrogen atoms on the left

side of the arrow (reactant side) and only 1 nitrogen atom on the right side (product side). In order to

balance the nitrogen atoms, use a coefficient of 2 in front of the ammonia on the right.

Now you have 2 nitrogen atoms on the left and 2 nitrogen atoms on the right.

Next, tackle the hydrogen atoms. You have 2 hydrogen atoms on the left and 6 hydrogen atoms on the

right. So put a 3 in front of the hydrogen atoms on the left, giving you:

That should do it. Do a check to be sure: You have 2 nitrogen atoms on the left and 2 nitrogen atoms on

the right. You have 6 hydrogen atoms on the left and 6 hydrogen atoms on the right.

The equation is balanced. You can read the equation this way: 1 nitrogen molecule reacts with 3

hydrogen molecules to yield 2 ammonia molecules.

This equation would have also balanced with coefficients of 2, 6, and 4 instead of 1, 3, and 2. In fact, any

multiple of 1, 3, and 2 would have balanced the equation, but chemists have agreed to always show the

lowest whole-number ratio.

 HUNDS RULE
The Aufbau section discussed how that electrons fill the lowest energy orbitals first, and then
move up to higher energy orbitals only after the lower energy orbitals are full. However, there a
problem with this rule. Certainly, 1s orbitals should be filled before 2s orbitals, because the 1s
orbitals have a lower value of n, and thus a lower energy. What about the three different 2p
orbitals? In what order should they be filled? The answer to this question involves Hund's rule.

Hund's rule states that:

1. Every orbital in a sublevel is singly occupied before any orbital is doubly occupied.
2. All of the electrons in singly occupied orbitals have the same spin (to maximize total spin).

When assigning electrons to orbitals, an electron first seeks to fill all the orbitals with similar
energy (also referred to as degenerate orbitals) before pairing with another electron in a half-filled
orbital. Atoms at ground states tend to have as many unpaired electrons as possible. In visualizing
this process, consider how electrons exhibit the same behavior as the same poles on a magnet
would if they came into contact; as the negatively charged electrons fill orbitals, they first try to
get as far as possible from each other before having to pair up.

EXAMPLE: NITROGEN ATOMS

Consider the correct electron configuration of the nitrogen (Z = 7) atom: 1s2 2s2 2p3

The p orbitals are half-filled; there are three electrons and three p orbitals. This is because the
three electrons in the 2p subshell will fill all the empty orbitals first before pairing with electrons
in them.

Keep in mind that elemental nitrogen is found in nature typically as dinitrogen, N2, which
requires molecular orbitals instead of atomic orbitals as demonstrated above.

EXAMPLE 1.21.2: OXYGEN ATOMS

Next, consider oxygen (Z = 8) atom, the element after nitrogen in the same period; its electron
configuration is: 1s2 2s2 2p4

Oxygen has one more electron than nitrogen; as the orbitals are all half-filled, the new electron
must pair up. Keep in mind that elemental oxygen is found in nature typically
as dioxygen, O2O2, which has molecular orbitals instead of atomic orbitals as demonstrated
above.