Material Balance

Material Balance is accounting of all

materials that enters, leaves, accumulate or
deplete in the operation for a given time
interval.
The material balance is the law of
conservation of mass
Material Balance is accounting of all
materials that enters, leaves, accumulate or
deplete in the operation for a given time
interval.
The material balance is the law of
conservation of mass

The general principle of material balance

calculation is to establish a number of
independent equation equal to the
number of unknowns of composition of
mass.
Suppose if two streams enters a process
and one stream leaves the mass and
composition of each stream establishes
the complete material balance.
Now the greatest number of unknown
permissible is three (2 entering and one
leaving)
Variations in solving the problem will

There are two types of material

balance problem which is faced
by the Industry.
Material balance which do no
involve any Chemical Reaction
e.g.
Drying,
Distillation,
Crystallization etc.
Material balance which involve
chemical
reaction
e.g.
Combustion,
Oxidation,

How to proceed to solve the problem?

The Material balance for the process with or
without Chemical Reaction can be written in
the following form:
[Material Input to the system] [Material
output

from

Generation

in

the
the

system]
system]

[Material

[Material

consumed in the system] = [Accumulation of

When the material balance is written on

the mass basis the generation in the
system and, consumption in the system
is zero whether chemical reaction occurs
or not.
This is because for all the ordinary
process the transformation of mass into
energy can be neglected and the Law of
Conservation of mass is universally valid
i.e.
Input - Output = Accumulation

Guidelines to solve the problem:

If no chemical reaction is involved the
material balance should be based on the
chemical compounds or the components
of fixed nature.
If the chemical reaction occurs, the
material balance should be based on
chemical elements or on radicals,
compounds or substances that are not
altered, decomposed or formed in the
process.

When no chemical reaction takes place weight

units, gm, kg or lb and if chemical reaction takes
place, it is desirable to use gm-mole, kg-mole, lbmole, gm-atom, kg-atom, lb-atom.
The number of unknown quantities to be
calculated can not exceed the number of
independent
material
balances
available
otherwise the problem is indeterminate.
If the number of independent material balance
equation exceeds the number of unknown weights
that are to be computed, it becomes matter of
judgment to determine which of the equations
should be selected to solve the problem. In
general equations based on components forming

Recognition of the minimum number of truly

independent equation is important. Any
material balance equation that can be
derived from other equations written for the
process can not be regarded as an additional
independent equation e.g. for a mixture of
H2SO4, HNO3 and Water, the balance can be
made on H2SO4, HNO3, Water, H2, S, O2, N2,
total weight. But only three are independent
based on H2SO4, HNO3 &total weight.
If any two or more substances exist in fixed
ratio with respect to one another in each
stream where they appear, only on
independent material balance equation may
be written with respect to these substances..

Knowledge of presence of a tie

substance
in two streams
establishes the relationship between
the weights of the streams. If one is
known other can be calculated.
The tie element is the material
which enters or leave the system in a
single stream or one which enters
and leaves with out any change e.g.
ash content or inert.

Let us now take some example

The following type of problem may be
encountered
in
Solubility
and
Crystallization
Calculate the amount of solute that can
be dissolved in specified quantity of
solvent or solution
Calculate the quantity of solvent
required to dissolve a given amount of
solute to produce a solution.

In the crystallization process equilibrium

is achieved between the solution i.e.
mother liquor and the crystals. Mother
Liquor leaving the process is saturated
solution
at
final
temperature
of
crystallization
The material balance is equation is easy
if the solute crystals are anhydrous.
In such cases simple solute and solvent
bases are sufficient.
When the crystals are hydrated, some of
the water in the solution is removed with
the crystals as a hydrate.

Let
W1 = kg of hydrated crystal formed
X1 = wt fraction of solute in the crystal
F

= wt of solution fed to the crystallizer

X2 = Solubility of the solute in wt fraction of

solute
W2 = weight of mother liquor remaining after
crystallization
W3 = Water evaporated during evaporation

W3 kg
water
evaporate
d
F kg Solution, Xf
wt. fraction of
solute

Crystallizer

W1 hydrated
crystal X1 wt
fraction of
solute

W2 kg mother
liquor
X2 wt fraction of
Solute

Total weight balance

F = W 1 + W 2 + W3
Solute balance
F.Xf = W1. X1 + W2 . X2
Solvent balance
F ( 1 Xf) = W1 (1-X1) + W2 (1X2) + W3