Chapter 3, Problem 3.29P

Interpretation Introduction

Interpretation:

The effectiveness of fertilizers, potassium nitrate, ammonium nitrate, ammonium sulfate, and urea according to their $\text{mass \% N}$ are to be ranked.

Concept introduction:

Molar mass is defined as the mass of $1\text{ mol}$ of a chemical substance in grams. The molar mass of a compound is calculated by the addition of the molar mass of each element multiplied by its number of atoms present in the chemical formula.

The molecular formula of a compound tells the number of atoms of each element present in the compound. Mass percent of an element represents the concentration of that element in a compound. The molar mass and the formula of the compound are used to calculate the mass percent of each element.

The formula to calculate the mass percent of an element A in a compound is as follows:

$\text{Mass \% of element A=}\left(\frac{\left(\begin{array}{l}\text{Moles of A}\\ \text{in formula}\end{array}\right)\left(\begin{array}{l}\text{Molar mass of A}\\ \text{in g/mol}\end{array}\right)}{\text{Mass of 1 mol of compound in g}}\right)\left(100\right)$ (1)