Summary The Quickest Way to Balance Equations

Title: The Quickest Way to Balance Chemical Equa8ons


📺 Video Walkthrough: Stuck on a step? Click: h8ps://youtu.be/fm_5vxEAvYw
to watch the video lesson that accompanies these notes. I recommend keeping
the video open as you work through the example below!


Balancing a chemical equa3on is effec3vely balancing elemental quan**es across the
equa3on as moles, obeying the law of conserva3on of mass or moles for each element in the
equa3on.

Key aspects:
1. Law of conserva3on of mass or moles: dictates that the respec3ve number of moles
of each element is the same on both sides of the equa3on.
Element Quan3ty on LeD Hand Side [moles] = Element Quan3ty on the Right Hand
Side [moles]
2. To balance a chemical equa3on, we must use stoichiometric coefficients, which
represents the rela3ve quan3ty of moles of compounds in a balanced chemical
equa3on.
3. Element Quan3ty is the product of the stoichiometric coefficient and moles of the
element in the respec3ve molecular compound.
Element Quan3ty [moles] = Stoichiometric coefficient x moles of element in molecular
compound.

Method:
For a walkthrough explana3on of the following example click the link below:

Let’s use the following chemical equa3on to demonstrate the method:

𝐶𝐻! + 𝑂" → 𝐶𝑂" + 𝐻" 𝑂

Step 1: Check the elemental balance.

Table 1: Element Quan//es per compound
LHS Element Quan*ty per RHS Element Quan*ty per
Compound Compound
Element
/ moles / moles
CH4 O2 CO2 H2O
C 1 0 1 0
H 4 0 0 2
O 0 2 2 1
In 1 mole of CH4, there is 1 mole of C and 4 moles of H.



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