Table of specific heat capacities

The table of specific heat capacities gives the volumetric heat capacity as well as the specific heat capacity of some substances and engineering materials, and (when applicable) the molar heat capacity.

Generally, the most notable constant parameter is the volumetric heat capacity (at least for solids) which is around the value of 3 megajoule per cubic meter per kelvin: ^[1]

$${\displaystyle \rho c_{p}\simeq 3\,{\text{MJ}}/({\text{m}}^{3}{\cdot }{\text{K}})\quad {\text{(solid)}}}$$

Note that the especially high molar values, as for paraffin, gasoline, water and ammonia, result from calculating specific heats in terms of moles of molecules. If specific heat is expressed per mole of atoms for these substances, none of the constant-volume values exceed, to any large extent, the theoretical Dulong–Petit limit of 25 J⋅mol⁻¹⋅K⁻¹ = 3  R per mole of atoms (see the last column of this table). For example, Paraffin has very large molecules and thus a high heat capacity per mole, but as a substance it does not have remarkable heat capacity in terms of volume, mass, or atom-mol (which is just 1.41 R per mole of atoms, or less than half of most solids, in terms of heat capacity per atom). The Dulong–Petit limit also explains why dense substances, such as lead, which have very heavy atoms, rank very low in mass heat capacity.

In the last column, major departures of solids at standard temperatures from the Dulong–Petit law value of 3 R, are usually due to low atomic weight plus high bond strength (as in diamond) causing some vibration modes to have too much energy to be available to store thermal energy at the measured temperature. For gases, departure from 3 R per mole of atoms is generally due to two factors: (1) failure of the higher quantum-energy-spaced vibration modes in gas molecules to be excited at room temperature, and (2) loss of potential energy degree of freedom for small gas molecules, simply because most of their atoms are not bonded maximally in space to other atoms, as happens in many solids.

Table of specific heat capacities at 25 °C (298 K) unless otherwise noted.^{[ citation needed ]} Notable minima and maxima are shown in maroon.

Substance	Phase	Isobaric mass heat capacity cP J⋅g−1⋅K−1	Molar heat capacity, CP,m and CV,m J⋅mol−1⋅K−1		Isobaric volumetric heat capacity CP,v J⋅cm−3⋅K−1	Isochoric molar by atom heat capacity CV,am mol-atom−1
			Isobaric	Isochoric
Air (Sea level, dry, 0 °C (273.15 K))	gas	1.0035	29.07	20.7643	0.001297
Air (typical room conditionsA)	gas	1.012	29.19	20.85	0.00121
Aluminium	solid	0.897	24.2		2.422	2.91 R
Ammonia	liquid	4.700	80.08		3.263	3.21 R
Animal tissue (incl. human) [2]	mixed	3.5			3.7*
Antimony	solid	0.207	25.2		1.386	3.03 R
Argon	gas	0.5203	20.7862	12.4717
Arsenic	solid	0.328	24.6		1.878	2.96 R
Beryllium	solid	1.82	16.4		3.367	1.97 R
Bismuth [3]	solid	0.123	25.7		1.20	3.09 R
Cadmium	solid	0.231	26.02		2.00	3.13 R
Carbon dioxide CO2 [4]	gas	0.839B	36.94	28.46
Chromium	solid	0.449	23.35		3.21	2.81 R
Copper	solid	0.385	24.47		3.45	2.94 R
Diamond	solid	0.5091	6.115		1.782	0.74 R
Ethanol	liquid	2.44	112		1.925
Gasoline (octane)	liquid	2.22	228		1.640
Glass [3]	solid	0.84			2.1
Gold	solid	0.129	25.42		2.492	3.05 R
Granite [3]	solid	0.790			2.17
Graphite	solid	0.710	8.53		1.534	1.03 R
Helium	gas	5.1932	20.7862	12.4717
Hydrogen	gas	14.30	28.82
Hydrogen sulfide H2S [4]	gas	1.015B	34.60
Iron [5]	solid	0.449	25.09 [6]		3.537	3.02 R
Lead	solid	0.129	26.4		1.440	3.18 R
Lithium	solid	3.58	24.8		1.912	2.98 R
Lithium at 181 °C [7]	solid(?)	4.233
Lithium at 181 °C [7]	liquid	4.379	30.33		2.242	3.65 R
Magnesium	solid	1.02	24.9		1.773	2.99 R
Mercury	liquid	0.1395	27.98		1.888	3.36 R
Methane at 2 °C	gas	2.191	35.69
Methanol [8]	liquid	2.14		68.62	1.695
Molten salt (142–540 °C) [9]	liquid	1.56			2.62
Nitrogen	gas	1.040	29.12	20.8
Neon	gas	1.0301	20.7862	12.4717
Oxygen	gas	0.918	29.38	21.0
Paraffin wax C25H52	solid	2.5 (avg)	900		2.325
Polyethylene (rotomolding grade) [10] [11]	solid	2.3027			2.15
Silica (fused)	solid	0.703	42.2		1.547
Silver [3]	solid	0.233	24.9		2.44	2.99 R
Sodium	solid	1.230	28.23		1.19	3.39 R
Steel	solid	0.466			3.756
Tin	solid	0.227	27.112		1.659	3.26 R
Titanium	solid	0.523	26.060		2.6384	3.13 R
Tungsten [3]	solid	0.134	24.8		2.58	2.98 R
Uranium	solid	0.116	27.7		2.216	3.33 R
Water at 100 °C (steam)	gas	2.03	36.5	27.5	1.53
Water at 25 °C	liquid	4.1816	75.34	74.55	4.138
Water at 100 °C	liquid	4.216[ dubious – discuss ]	75.95	67.9	3.77
Water at −10 °C (ice) [3]	solid	2.05	38.09		1.938
Zinc [3]	solid	0.387	25.2		2.76	3.03 R
Substance	Phase	Isobaric mass heat capacity cP J⋅g−1⋅K−1	Isobaric molar heat capacity CP,m J⋅mol−1⋅K−1	Isochore molar heat capacity CV,m J⋅mol−1⋅K−1	Isobaric volumetric heat capacity CP,v J⋅cm−3⋅K−1	Isochore atom-molar heat capacity in units of R CV,am atom-mol−1

^A Assuming an altitude of 194 metres above mean sea level (the worldwide median altitude of human habitation), an indoor temperature of 23 °C, a dewpoint of 9 °C (40.85% relative humidity), and 760  mmHg sea level–corrected barometric pressure (molar water vapor content = 1.16%).

^B Calculated values
*Derived data by calculation. This is for water-rich tissues such as brain. The whole-body average figure for mammals is approximately 2.9 J⋅cm⁻³⋅K^{−1 [12]}

Mass heat capacity of building materials

See also: Thermal mass

(Usually of interest to builders and solar )

Mass heat capacity of building materials

Substance	Phase	cP J⋅g−1⋅K−1
Asphalt	solid	0.920
Brick	solid	0.840
Concrete	solid	0.880
Glass, silica	liquid	0.840
Glass, crown	liquid	0.670
Glass, flint	liquid	0.503
Glass, borosilicate	liquid	0.753
Granite	solid	0.790
Gypsum	solid	1.090
Marble, mica	solid	0.880
Sand	solid	0.835
Soil	solid	0.800
Water	liquid	4.1813
Wood	solid	1.7 (1.2 to 2.9)
Substance	Phase	cP J⋅g−1⋅K−1

Human body

The specific heat of the human body calculated from the measured values of individual tissues is 2.98 kJ · kg−1 · °C−1. This is 17% lower than the earlier wider used one based on non measured values of 3.47 kJ · kg−1· °C−1. The contribution of the muscle to the specific heat of the body is approximately 47%, and the contribution of the fat and skin is approximately 24%. The specific heat of tissues range from ~0.7 kJ · kg−1 · °C−1 for tooth (enamel) to 4.2 kJ · kg−1 · °C−1 for eye (sclera). ^[13]

See also

• List of thermal conductivities

References

1. Ashby, Shercliff, Cebon, Materials, Cambridge University Press, Chapter 12: Atoms in vibration: material and heat
2. Page 183 in: Cornelius, Flemming (2008). Medical biophysics (6th ed.). ISBN   978-1-4020-7110-2. (also giving a density of 1.06 kg/L)
3. "Table of Specific Heats".
4. Young; Geller (2008). Young and Geller College Physics (8th ed.). Pearson Education. ISBN   978-0-8053-9218-0.
5. https://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/specific-heat-capacity-d_391.html
6. Chase, Malcolm W., ed. (1998). "Iron (Fe)". Journal of Physical and Chemical Reference Data Monograph No. 9 (PDF). NIST-JANAF Thermochemical Tables (Fourth ed.). Woodbury, New York: American Institute of Physics & American Chemical Society. p. 1221. ISBN   1-56396-831-2. OCLC   39682152 . Retrieved 11 February 2025.
7. "Materials Properties Handbook, Material: Lithium" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on September 5, 2006.
8. "HCV (Molar Heat Capacity (cV)) Data for Methanol". Dortmund Data Bank Software and Separation Technology.
9. "Heat Storage in Materials". The Engineering Toolbox.
10. Crawford, R. J. Rotational molding of plastics. ISBN   978-1-59124-192-8.
11. Gaur, Umesh; Wunderlich, Bernhard (1981). "Heat capacity and other thermodynamic properties of linear macromolecules. II. Polyethylene" (PDF). Journal of Physical and Chemical Reference Data. 10 (1): 119. Bibcode:1981JPCRD..10..119G. doi:10.1063/1.555636.
12. Faber, P.; Garby, L. (1995). "Fat content affects heat capacity: a study in mice". Acta Physiologica Scandinavica. 153 (2): 185–7. doi:10.1111/j.1748-1716.1995.tb09850.x. PMID   7778459.
13. Xu, Xiaojiang; Rioux, Timothy P.; Castellani, Michael P. (2023). "The specific heat of the human body is lower than previously believed: The journal Temperature toolbox". Temperature. 10 (2): 235–239. doi:10.1080/23328940.2022.2088034. ISSN   2332-8940. PMC   10274559 . PMID   37332308.