Question

Water if often used as a coolant, a liquid to remove heat from things like hot engines. One reasons is that water can absorb a lot of heat without changing temperature too much.
What property of water allows it to do this?

• A. Water has a high latent heat of fusion.
• B. Water has a low latent heat of fusion.
• C. Water has a high specific heat capacity.
• D. Water has a low specific heat capacity.
• E. Water has a low latent heat of vaporization.

Answer 1

The correct option is C Water has a high specific heat capacity.

The heat given $\Delta Q$ to a substance of specific heat $c$ and mass $m$ to change the temperature by $\Delta t$ is given by ,

$\Delta Q=mc\Delta t$ ,

above equation implies that $\Delta Q$ depends upon the product of $c$ and $\Delta t$ for a constant $\Delta Q$ , if $c$ is higher than $\Delta t$ will be smaller and vice-versa .Water has a very high specific heat therefore when heat is absorbed by water , its temperature change will be small , so it can absorb more heat .