Question

Write a note on the discovery of carbon dioxide and its occurrence.

Answer 1

Discovery of carbon dioxide

• Carbon dioxide was first prepared in 1630 by the Flemish chemist Jan Baptista van Belmont by burning charcoal in a closed vessel.
• He observed that the mass of the resulting ash was much less than that of the original charcoal.
• He concluded that the rest of the charcoal had been transformed into an invisible substance, i.e., a gas.
• In the 1750s, Scottish chemist and physician, Joseph black studied the properties of carbon dioxide by treating limestone with acids.
• The gas that evolved was called fixed air. In 1783, Antoine Lavoisier studied its composition and found that the gas was an oxide of carbon.

Occurrence of carbon dioxide

• Carbon dioxide is present in both free and combined states. About 0.03% of air by volume is carbon dioxide.
• Carbon dioxide is also given out during volcanic eruptions. It is fairly soluble in water, thus it occurs in dissolved form in natural water.
• Carbon dioxide also occurs as metallic carbonates and bicarbonates in the earth's crust and sea shells or coral reefs.