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The Initial Concentration

We finally need to determine the initial concentration of the gasoline in the reservoir. Recall that we assumed that mixing was instantaneous and complete. Therefore, we can find the initial concentration by dividing the mass of the gasoline spilled by the volume of the reservoir.

However, we want to find out how much mass has escaped, not what concentration remains. The routine solves for the final concentration given the initial concentration. If we want to know how much mass has escaped, we will need to multiply the final concentration by the total reservoir volume in order to find out how much mass remains. For your reference, we provide the following known information which you will need.
Density of gasoline: 800,000 mg/liter
Liters in a gallon: 3.79 liters/gallon
Volume of water in Lake: 898,800 gallons
Volume of gasoline spilled: 10 gallons

Using this information, calculate the original concentration of gasoline in the reservoir, in mg/liter, to the nearest tenth.

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John Hoggard <hoggard@math.vt.edu>
Last modified: Tue Aug 12 21:24:27 EDT 1997