how come spilled water inside and outside evaporates so quickly despite water’s evaporation point bring 100°, no where near the ambient temperature in home or outside?

Question

how come spilled water inside and outside evaporates so quickly despite water’s evaporation point bring 100°, no where near the ambient temperature in home or outside?

In: 365

Answer 1

The latent heat of vaporization is the amount of energy needed in a substance to change phases from a liquid to a gas. At 100° Celsius temperature and one atmosphere of pressure, there is enough energy that this change is pretty much immediate. At lower temperatures, however, there can still be enough energy to cause some of the substance to change from liquid to gas. At higher temperatures and lower pressures, the likelihood of this phase change increases, which is why water at 2° C tends to take longer to evaporate than water at 50° C, which takes even longer than water at 100° C.