Take the 2-minute tour ×  This is an elementary question but I
do not know the answer to it. During a phase transition such as
melting a solid to a liquid the temperature remains constant. At
any lower temperature the heat provided went to kinetic energy
and intermolecular potential energy. Why is it that at the
melting point no energy goes into kinetic (that would increase
the temperature)?  share|improve this question Because the
substance uses that energy for the phase transition. –  Anuar
Dec 2 '12 at 18:43  2 Answers 2  Roughly speaking, this
additional energy will be at first step kinetic, it will
increase molecule bouncing around there equilibrium points,
until it will be enough to take them out of that equilibrium,
and then this energy spent to make the phase transition.  More
precisely your confusion is because of the fact that the
statement you mentioned "temperature will not change.." is right
in quasi-statistical equilibrium processes, that is it's right
when looking on the process from macro poin