Salt Formation, Explained

I will now explain the earlier posted process. Before the process can occur, two materials are needed, these being sodium metal and chlorine gas. Energy must be contributed to sublime the sodium. Energy is also required to take away an electron from an atom of the sodium gas. As chlorine is already a gas, no phase transition is needed. Energy is needed to separate the two Cl atoms bonded together in the gas, so that each individual atom can react with the sodium. All of the steps so far have been endothermic, they require energy. The next steps will all release energy, so they are called exothermic. After the Cl2 is separated, an electron is added to a Cl atom to form an anion. In the last step, the Cl anions and the Na cations come together due to the attractive forces of each. In the case of sodium chloride, a large amount of energy is released from this last step. This is the lattice energy.