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Why does a boiling pot of water remain at 100 °C until the water has evaporated?
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Figure 1: Phase diagram of argon.
A boiling pot of water remains at 100 °C until all the liquid has evaporated because the additional heat being supplied to the system is consumed as latent heat of vaporization.
During a phase change, energy is absorbed to overcome the forces of attraction between molecules rather than to increase the kinetic energy of the particles, which would otherwise raise the temperature. This energy is carried away by the escaping vapour molecules. Because this process requires a significant amount of energy—known as the heat of vaporization—the temperature of the remaining liquid water stays constant at the boiling point until the transition to the gaseous state is complete.213