Water to Steam Conversion

Latent Heat and Steam Formation

As we have discussed earlier, most substances exist in three forms: solid, liquid or gas. These forms are referred to as “phases”. The phase of a substance depends upon the energy content of its molecules. If we start off with the solid phase and add heat to the mass, we will increase the energy content of the molecules. If we increase the energy content sufficiently, solid will turn into liquid. And if we keep on adding more heat, the liquid will eventually turn into a gas or vapor.

The opposite of the above is also true. If we extract heat from a vapor or gas, it eventually becomes liquid again.

This is a very common phenomenon and it involves certain technical details and terminology, which we will discuss now.