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Outside Asylum Take a walk, smell the roses. Any topic is fine, save people bashing. |
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Outside Asylum Take a walk, smell the roses. Any topic is fine, save people bashing. |
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In Reply to: Question for you eco-dorks.... posted by HiFi Guy on February 19, 2007 at 07:53:18:
There's a gummint web page with this very question as its title.
It seems impossible that a gallon of gasoline, which weighs about 6.3 pounds, could produce 20 pounds of carbon dioxide (CO2) when burned. However, most of the weight of the CO2 doesn't come from the gasoline itself, but the oxygen in the air.When gasoline burns, the carbon and hydrogen separate. The hydrogen combines with oxygen to form water (H2O), and carbon combines with oxygen to form carbon dioxide (CO2).
CO2 molecule with one carbon atom (atomic weight 12) and two oxygen atoms (atomic weight of 16 each)A carbon atom has a weight of 12, and each oxygen atom has a weight of 16, giving each single molecule of CO2 an atomic weight of 44 (12 from carbon and 32 from oxygen).
Therefore, to calculate the amount of CO2 produced from a gallon of gasoline, the weight of the carbon in the gasoline is multiplied by 44/12 or 3.7.
Since gasoline is about 87% carbon and 13% hydrogen by weight, the carbon in a gallon of gasoline weighs 5.5 pounds (6.3 lbs. x .87).
We can then multiply the weight of the carbon (5.5 pounds) by 3.7, which equals 20 pounds of CO2!
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Follow Ups
- Looky here - GliderGuider 02/19/0709:50:19 02/19/07 (3)
- Re: Looky here - Victor Khomenko 09:57:43 02/19/07 (1)
- Simple. - j_thunders 10:25:48 02/19/07 (0)
- Larry only believes the guv'mint when its Bush, Cheney, or the DoD. - olddude55 09:54:26 02/19/07 (0)
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