Describe the law of conservation of mass and the process of balancing a single replacement reaction

Answer 1

The law of conservation of mass simply means that mass cannot be created nor destroyed, but it can change forms. So, in any chemical reaction, the mass of the reactants must be equal to the mass of the products. In a single replacement reaction, you have a single element replacing another element that is part of a compound. To balance this type of reaction, one must be certain that the mass (moles) of the single element and the compound equals the mass of the new compound that is formed, plus the mass of the element that was liberated. For example:

A + BC ==> AC + B

Mass of A + mass of BC must equal mass of AC + mass of B