Energy, Hydrocarbons, and Nuclear Power

Directions: Respond to the questions below.

1. What are the three major fossil fuels?
2. Why does 2-butene have cis and trans isomers but 1-butene doesn’t?
3. List three gasoline additives that increase the octane rating of gasoline
4. The process used to make biodiesel from soy requires the use of methanol. What does this imply about the notion that biodiesels can eliminate the need for fossil fuels?
5. A pure sample of a radioactive isotope weighing 156 mg and with a half-life of 128 days is allowed to decay for one year Approximately how much of the isotope remains?
6. Carbon-14 dating uses the carbon-14 half-life of 5730 years to estimate the age of carbon-containing samples. How old is a wooden throne if the current carbon-14 activity is one-eighth of the original?
7. What effect does the emission of a beta particle have on the mass number of a nucleus?
8. Describe nuclear fission: 
   1. What is the starting material?
   2. What is needed to cause fission?
   3. What are the products of fission?