PRESENTER: Let's work a problem about melting a small frozen pond. When we set up the equations, we'll always put our source of heating or cooling on the left, and the things changing temperature or phase on the right. We'll start with the simplest case, and then introduce more information see how to solve the problems.

The energy required to melt all the ice is simply the integral of the heating rate over time. That goes on the left side, because it's a source. The change that we're observing is the melting of the ice into liquid water.

For this first part, there is no temperature change, just a phase change. We need to know the mass of the ice, and the latent heat of fusion, which tells us about the amount of energy required to convert ice to liquid water. The energy required is about three million joules.

Now, let's complicate the problem a little more. Let's start with the ice at a temperature of minus 20 degrees C, but we are still interested in the energy required to melt the ice. Now, we need more energy. Well, we'll need to first raise the temperature of the ice to 0 degrees from minus 20 degrees C, and then we can melt it. So only two terms in the equation. So we add the second term, which accounts for the energy required to raise 10 kilograms of ice by 20 degrees C. Takes another million joules.

Now we'll specify that the solar heating rate was 200 watts per meter squared. And now we know what the area of the puddle is. So the integral of the heating rate is just the average heating rate times time, if the heating rate is constant. And so that gives us a way to figure out how long it would take to melt all the ice.

We write down the equation for heating on the left, and the changes on the right. The changes, remember, include both the melting of the ice, and the raising of the ice temperature from minus 20 degrees C to 0. Then we rearrange the equation so that only the times remain on the left. When we do this, the answer is that it takes about three hours.