Question

Write word equations for the two reactions needed to produce copper.

Answer 1

Answer:

Word equations

A word equation shows the names of each substance involved in a reaction, and must not include any chemical symbols or formulae. For example:

copper + oxygen → copper oxide

In this reaction, copper and oxygen are the reactants, and copper oxide is the product.

Balanced equations

A balanced equation gives more information about a chemical reaction because it includes the symbols and formulae of the substances involved. There are two steps in writing a balanced equation:

replace the name of each substance with its symbol or formula

use numbers to balance the equation, if it is not already balanced

In the example above (the reaction between copper and oxygen to make copper oxide), we get this in the first step:

Cu + O2 → CuO

This is unbalanced because there is one copper atom on each side of the arrow, but two oxygen atoms on the left and only one on the right. To balance the equation, you need to adjust the number of units of some of the substances until we get equal numbers of each type of atom on both sides. You should never change the formula of a substance to do this.

Here is the balanced symbol equation:

2Cu + O2 → 2CuO

You can see that we now have two copper atoms and two oxygen atoms on each side. This matches what happens in the reaction: