Question

Write down the balanced chemical equation:

Hydrogen plus oxygen produces water

Answer 1

Balanced chemical equation: A chemical equation in which the number of atoms of each element on both sides of the equation is equal is called a balanced chemical equation.

Step 1: Representation of the chemical reaction:

• Hydrogen reacts with oxygen to produce water.
• The chemical reaction can be written as:

$\underset{\mathrm{Hydrogen}}{{\mathrm{H}}_2}+\underset{\mathrm{Oxygen}}{{\mathrm{O}}_2}\to \underset{\mathrm{Water}}{{\mathrm{H}}_2\mathrm{O}}$

Step 2: Calculating the number of atoms on both sides of the reaction:

Elements	Number of atoms on reactant side	Number of atoms on product side
H	2	2
O	2	1

Step 3: Balancing the uneven number of atoms on the reactants and products side:

1. As the number of atoms on reactants and products side is different, so so balancing of hydrogen and oxygen can be done by multiplying the required coefficient for them in the reaction.
2. This is done by multiplying 2 to hydrogen on the reactant side and also 2 to water on the product side, to make the two sides equal.

$\underset{\mathrm{Hydrogen}}{2{\mathrm{H}}_2}+\underset{\mathrm{Oxygen}}{{\mathrm{O}}_2}\to \underset{\mathrm{Water}}{2{\mathrm{H}}_2\mathrm{O}}$

Elements	Number of atoms on the reactant side	Number of atoms on the product side
H	4	4
O	2	2

Now, we can see that the balanced equation is:

$\underset{\mathrm{Hydrogen}}{2{\mathrm{H}}_2}+\underset{\mathrm{Oxygen}}{{\mathrm{O}}_2}\to \underset{\mathrm{Water}}{2{\mathrm{H}}_2\mathrm{O}}$