Zusammenfassung der Ressource
Specific Heat Capacity
- Basics
- Materials which need to gain lots of energy
to warm up also release lots of energy
when cooling down – ‘store’ lots of heat.
- When substance is
heated, temp depends on:
- Amount of energy
supplied to it
- Mass of substance
- What substance is
- Specific heat capacity of a substance:
energy needed/transferred to 1kg of
substance needed to raise its temp by 1°C.
- Unit for specific heat capacity is joules per kg per °C.
- Formula: E = m x c x θ
- Where E = energy
transferred in J
- m = mass in kg
- c = specific heat capacity in J/kg °C
- θ = temp change in °C.
- To find specific heat capacity –
rearrange equation: c = E/m x θ
- Storage Heaters
- Materials used in them usually
have high specific heat
capacities to store lots of energy.
- Water has high specific heat capacity
+ is liquid so can be pumped in pipes
– ideal for central heating.
- Uses electricity at night (off-peak) to heat special
bricks/concrete blocks in heater. Energy transfer
from bricks keeps room warm – have high specific
heat capacity - store lots of energy. Warm up slowly
when heater element is on + cools slowly when off.
- Some are filled with oil which has specific
heat capacity that’s lower than water – often
not as good as water -based systems.
- However oil does have higher boiling
point – oil filled heaters can safely reach
higher temps than water-based ones.
- Electricity consumed at off-peak
times sometimes charged at
cheaper rate – storage heaters
designed to be effective.