Question

How do gas laws affect hot air balloons?

Answer 1

Hint:As we know that according to the gas laws, pressure and volume are directly related to the temperature which are commonly known by various laws like Charles’ laws, Boyle’s law and pressure temperature etc.

Complete step-by-step answer:
As we know that Charles’ law states that the volume of a gas is directly proportional to the temperature of the gas. So when the temperature in a hot air balloon is increased, the volume of the gas increases meaning the gas expands. The balloon with a fixed volume possesses a hole at the bottom thus extra volume flows out of that hole of the balloon. When gas in the balloon is allowed to cool down, hot air volume of gas decreases.

Now, according to pressure temperature law, the volume is constant and it is inversely related to the weight of the air, so volume decreases. As the air in the balloon gets hot, the weight of the balloon and hot air becomes less than the weight of the same volume of cold air thus the balloon starts to rise up.

And according to Boyle’s law, the pressure is exerted on the walls of the balloon, thus the size of balloon increases when pressure is decreased. But when a hot air balloon rises up the height increases which leads to decrease in pressure as there are less molecules above.

Note: Always remember that a gas is composed of large molecules of small atoms which constantly move and randomly collide with other atoms or molecules, so when temperature is increased the kinetic energy of the molecules increases.