How can the continuous addition of heat in a closed system cause it to explode?
2 answers:
Answer:
The heat builds pressure
Explanation:
Consider an ideal gas in a closed system (like a gas in a container: in this case, the volume of the gas is fixed). The ideal gas equation states that:
where
p is the gas pressure
V is the gas volume
n is the number of moles of the gas
R is the gas constant
T is the gas temperature
If heat is added to the gas, its temperature T increases. n and R are constant, and V is constant as well (the container does not change its volume), so this means that the pressure of the gas, p, increases as well. The more heat is added, the more the temperature increases, the more the pressure increase: at some point, the pressure against the internal walls of the container will become so strong that the container will explode.
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