Freezing: sensible heat, latent heat and power

Why is mcΔT alone insufficient to estimate freezing requirements?

An experiment from Cyril Voyant’s course, running in your browser. Full course and slides (French) · Choose another experiment.

The relationship to understand

Q=mΔh; Δh adds cooling before freezing, latent heat and cooling after freezing. Average power P=Q/Δt.

Try it and interpret

With the total energy unchanged, doubling the duration halves the average power. Change water content and the fraction actually frozen to isolate the contribution of latent heat.

Assumptions and limitations

Simplified balance with fixed heat capacities and a user-selected ice fraction. It determines neither freezing kinetics nor instantaneous equipment power. Not all water in food necessarily freezes.

Go further with the course

This page focuses on one concept. The full chapter (French) contains the reasoning, further examples, slides and FAQ. Demonstration values are computed or constructed within the stated model; they are not new research findings.