A pile of firewood is more stable as ash and smoke than firewood. Why does this pile of firewood not immediately release the energy in its chemical bonds? (Use the word activation energy in your answer)
Could anybody help with this? I dont understand and not sure how to write this, and i need a kick in the right direction since I'm kind of confused .
2 answers
If you do bond energies or free energy calculations (delta G) you know that some rreactons are sontaneous and some are not. Burning firewood is a spontaneous reaction BUT it sits there and looks at you and does NOT burst into flame instantly. Likewise, diamonds (expensive) changing over to graphite (graphite is cheap as dirt) is spontaneous. So why does firwood NOT burst into flame and why do diamonds hang around for years while maintaining their beauty and expensive nature. The answer is activation energy. The molecules in firewood don't have enough energy to START the reaction (the burning) but once started the heat produced keeps the cycle going and the reaction continues. The same reasoning applies to the diamond. There are a number of sites on the web that may explain this better than I. You can Google something like "examples of activation energy" or "calculations showing activation energy" or "activation energy discussion". I have found the url libre text very good at explaining things so you may want to try that also. Good luck. Hope this helps. I know it's long but you can distill it down so it make sense to you. If it doesn't please repost and be specific about what's giving you trouble about it.
Thank you Dr bob, this actually really helped a lot! After your explanation I was able to do some more research and write the question, so much is appreciated ! I guess the way the question was formated had confused me, but after hearing someone explain it it helps a lot. Thanks again!