Bomb Calorimeter Research Paper

A fuel is any material that can be made to react with other substances so that it releases chemical energy as heat. Fuels can range from solid forms such as coal, liquid forms such as LPG & gas forms such as propane (you, 2017). Most of the fuels used are fossil fuels. Over 81% of America’s fuels are fossil fuels, these include fuels such as oil, coal and natural gas. Fossil fuels are fuels that are extracted from the earth, this means that they are a limited resource. This creates the need for renewable energy. Renewable energy comes from sources such harnessing power from the sun in solar panels, or using wind with wind turbines. Combustion is a high-temperature exothermic redox chemical reaction between a fuel and an oxidant that produces …show more content…
A calorimeter is a device used to measure heat of reaction. It can be sophisticated and expensive or simple and cheap. Bomb calorimeters are a more advanced way to more efficiently measure the heat released by combustion reactions. A bomb calorimeter is a sealed vessel that contains a smaller container called a "bomb." The bomb is a container designed to withstand high pressure, and is equipped with valves for adding gases and electrical contacts for initiating combustion reactions (Learner.org, 2017). “Calorimetry has a very broad range of applicability, with examples ranging from drug design in the pharmaceutical industry, to quality control of process streams in the chemical industry (Science.uwaterloo.ca, 2017).” For this experiment it will be used to measure the heat produced by different mixtures of alcohol’s and alkanes. The different types of alkanes used will be pentane (C5H12), hexane (C6H14), heptane (C7H16) and octane (C8H18). They will be mixed with the alcohol pentanol (C5H12O). The formula used to calculate the heat is