Given:
175 kg methane (CH4) to be converted to hydrogen cyanide (HCN)
First, we need to set-up a balanced chemical equation:
2 CH4 + 2 NH3 + 3 O2 → 2 HCN + 6 H2O
To determine the mass of ammonia and the mass of molecular oxygen, we need the molar masses of each compound:
Molar mass:
CH4 = 16 g/mol
NH3 = 17 g/mol
O2 = 32 g/mol
mass of NH3 = 175kg /16kg/kmol * (2/2) * 17kg/kmol
mass of NH3 = 185.94 kg NH3
mass of O = 175kg/16 * (3/2) * (1/2) * 16kg/kmol
mass of O = 131.25 kg molecular O.
