Hard Boiling an Egg on a Mountaintop, Pressure Cookers, and lce Skating

Phase equilibria are affected by external pressure'

Depending on atmospheric conditions. the boiling

point and freezing point of water may deviate appreciably from 100"C and 0"C, respectively, as we see
below.

Hard-Boiting an Egg on a Mountaintop

Suppose you have just scaled Pike's Peak in Colorado. To help regain your strength following the
strenuous work, you decide to hard-boil an egg and
eat it. To your surprise, water seems to boil more
quickly than usual, but after '10 minutes in boiling
water; the egg is still not cooked. A little knowledge
could have saved you the disapof phase

"qritiUti.
pointment
of cracking open an uncooked egg (especially if it is the only egg you brought with you)'
The summit of Pike's Peak is 14,000 ft above sea
level. At this altitude, the atmospheric pressure is
only about 0.6 atm. From Figure 11'40(b), we see
that the boiling point of water decreases with decreasing pressure, so at the lower pressure water
will boil at about 86'C. However, it is not the boiling
action but the amount of heat delivered to the egg
that does the actual cooking, and the amount of
heat delivered is proportional to the temperature
of the water. For this reason, it would take considerably longet perhaps 30 minutes, to hard-cook

lce Skating
Let us now turn to the ice-water equilibrium' The
negative slope of the solid-liquid curve means that

the melting point of ice decreases with increasing

external pressure, as shown in Figure 11.40(b)' This
phenomenon helps to make ice skating possible' Because skates have very thin runners, a 130-lb person
can exert a pressure equivalent to 500 atm on the
ice. (Remember that pressure is defined as force per
unit area.) Consequently, at a temperature lower
than 0"C, the ice under the skates melts and the f ilm
of water formed under the runner facilitates the
movement of the skater over ice. Calculations show
that the melting point of ice decreases by 7'4x
10-3'C when the pressure increases by 1 atm' Thus,
when the pressure exerted on the ice by the skater
is 500 atm, the melting point falls to -(500 x 7 '4 x
10-3), or *3.7'C. Actually, it turns out that friction
between the blades and the ice is the maior cause
for melting the ice. This explains why it is possible to
skate outdoors even when the temperature drops
below -20'C.

your egg.

Pressure Cookers
The effect of pressure on boiling point also explains
why pressure cookers save time in the kitchen' A

pressure cooker is a sealed container that allows

steam to escape only when it exceeds a certain pressure. The pressure above the water in the cooker is
the sum of the atmospheric pressure and the pressure of the steam. Consequently, the water in the
pressure cooker wilt boil at a hgher temperature
than'100'C and the food in it will be hotter and
cook faster.

The pressure exerted by the skater on ice lowers its melting

point, and the film of water formed under the blades acts as a
lubricant between the skate and the ice.

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