Unit 4 Lesson 5

Atom Inventory

Balancing Chemical Equations

Balanced chemical equations show the true mathematical relationship between the reactants and the products in a chemical reaction.

• When balancing, start with atoms that only show up once on each side of the equation
• You can only change the coefficients
• Coefficients indicate how many "units" of an element or compound are present

Ex: __N2(g) + __H2(g) ---> __NH3(g) this equation is unbalanced because there are 2 nitrogen atoms and 2 hydrogen atoms in the reactant side but there is only 1 nitrogen and 3 hydrogen in the product. To fix this, change the coefficients.
N2 + 3H2 ---> 2NH3 Now this equation is balanced because there are 2 nitrogen atoms on both sides and 6 hydrogen atoms on either side.
Practice Problems

3) a. Make three loaves of bread because 6 divided by 2 is 3
    b. because if you multiply all the ingredients by 3 it's balancing both sides of the recipe to use all six bananas.

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