Relative speeds of chemical reactions | Chemical Reactions | Chemistry

When chemicals react with each other, the rates of reaction vary greatly and can be very slow or very fast. Vinegar reacts very quickly with baking soda, releasing carbon dioxide as bubbles. Compared to this, rusting of iron is a very slow reaction as it takes a few days for iron nails left in water to oxidize and produce rust. Much slower still is the reaction that forms fossil fuels out of decaying organic matter. The energy and ecology crisis that we are facing today comes down to different rates of reaction - it takes very little time to burn fossil fuel while a very long time is needed to create it!