A sealed container comtains 1.50 mol of nitrogen gas, 2.00 mol of oxygen gas and 3.50 mol of argon gas. If the total pressure is 900 kPa, what is the pressure of the nitrogen gas?
Add mols to obtain nTotal.
mole fraction N2 = XN2 = nN2/nTotal
pN2 = XN2*Ptotal
To find the pressure of nitrogen gas, we need to apply Dalton's Law of Partial Pressures, which states that in a mixture of gases, the total pressure is the sum of the partial pressures of each individual gas.
In this case, we have nitrogen gas, oxygen gas, and argon gas in the sealed container.
Step 1: Calculate the mole fractions of each gas.
The mole fraction of a gas is the ratio of the number of moles of that gas to the total number of moles of all gases.
Mole fraction of nitrogen gas (X_N2) = Moles of nitrogen gas / Total moles of all gases
= 1.50 mol / (1.50 mol + 2.00 mol + 3.50 mol)
= 1.50 mol / 7.00 mol
= 0.2143
Step 2: Use the mole fraction to calculate the partial pressure of nitrogen gas.
The partial pressure of a gas is the pressure it would exert if it were the only gas in the container.
Partial pressure of nitrogen gas (P_N2) = Mole fraction of nitrogen gas × Total pressure
= 0.2143 × 900 kPa
= 192.9 kPa
Therefore, the pressure of the nitrogen gas is 192.9 kPa.