Heat Energy & Mass: How Can Snow Have More Heat Energy?

[NoHeart]

how can 30,000 kg of snow at 0 C have more heat energy than 1 mL of water at 100 C?

 

[russ_watters]

Snow at 0C still contains heat - more heat than snow at -5C. Heat content is measured on an absolute scale starting at absolute zero (-273C).

 

[Integral]

Keep in mind that when measuring heat content, temperature must be measured on the Kelvin scale.

 

[nu_paradigm]

Suppose we have a sample A of 30000 kg of ice and a sample B of 1g of ice(1ml of water) both at absolute zero, then if we start heating them, so that sample A reaches 0^{0}\ C and sample B reaches 100^{0}\ C, we can calculate the heat they will have,

\mbox{For Ice at sample A,}

M_{ice}\ S_{ice}\ (\delta T)\\ =\ 30000\times 1000 g\ (0.50 \frac{cal}{g K})\ (273.15\ K)

= 4097250000\ cal

= 9.788 \times 10^{5} kJ


\mbox{And for ice(water) at sample B,}

M_{ice B}\ S_{ice}\ (\delta T_{1})\ +\ M_{ice B}\ L_{fusion}\ +\ M_{water}\ S_{water}\ (\delta T_{2})

=\ 1g\ (0.50 \frac{cal}{g K})\ (273.15\ K)\ +\ 1 g\ (80\frac{cal}{g})\ +\ 1\ g\ (1\frac{cal}{g K})\ (100 K)

=\ 316.575 cal

=\ 7.562 10^{-2}\ kJ

So u can see, that the sample A of ice has much much more heat!