Composition of Sandstone Rock: Calcium Carbonate and Silica

i) What is the mass of calcium carbonate in the sandstone rock in milligrams?

ii) What is the percent of calcium carbonate in the sandstone rock?

iii) What is the percentage of silica in sandstone rock?

Final answer:

To find the mass and percent of calcium carbonate and silica in the sandstone rock, you need to use stoichiometry and proportions.

Explanation:

i) To find the mass of calcium carbonate in the sandstone rock, we need to use stoichiometry. The balanced chemical equation for the decomposition of calcium carbonate is: CaCO3 --> CaO + CO2. From the equation, we can see that 1 mole of CaCO3 produces 1 mole of CO2. We can set up a proportion: (mass of CO2 / molar mass of CO2) = (mass of CaCO3 / molar mass of CaCO3). Using the given values, we can calculate the mass of calcium carbonate.

ii) To find the percent of calcium carbonate in the sandstone rock, we can use the equation: (mass of CaCO3 / mass of sandstone rock) x 100%. Using the calculated mass of calcium carbonate and the given mass of sandstone rock, the percent can be calculated.

iii) To find the percentage of silica in the sandstone rock, we can subtract the percent of calcium carbonate from 100%. This will give us the percent of silica in the sandstone rock.