Table 2.

Energy of formation of silicon-containing compounds. The energies of formation of Si-containing compounds are generally much higher, and therefore less favorable, than their carbon counterparts. Thermodynamic values were collected from the literature [72,73], including NIST-JANAFF thermochemical tables [74] and calculated by the GAMESS model for entropy (v1.0) [75,76,77]. All calculations are done for molecules in their standard state. XO₂ corresponds to carbon- or silicon-containing substrates, carbon dioxide and silica, respectively (see Appendix E.2 for details on the modeled chemical reactions).

Silicon Compound	Carbon Analogue	ΔG° Formation kJ/mol (298 K)		ΔG Formation from XO2, H2O, N2, HCl, HF, H3PO4 + H2 (Standard State)
		Silicon	Carbon	Silicon	Carbon
Silane SiH4	Methane CH4	57.2	−51.12	434.17	−141.62
Disilane Si2H6	Ethane C2H6	127.07	−32.25	880.99	−213.23
Trisilane Si3H8	Propane C3H8	185.18	−23.84	1316.06	−295.32
Tetramethylsilane SiC4H10	Neopentane C5H12	−96.13	−22.35	−81.14	−474.8
Diethylsilane SiC4H10	n-pentane C5H12	−46.96	−8.24	−31.96	−460.69
Trimethylsilanol (CH3)3SiOH	Tert-butanol (CH3)3COH	−372.64	−175.46	−28.81	−299.08
Chlorosilane SiH3Cl	Chloromethane CH3Cl	−116.104	−59.88	−356.08	−55.15
Hexachlorodisilane Si2Cl6	Hexachlorethane C2Cl6	−970.08	−57.61	355.16	332.73
Silicon tetrafluoride SiF4	Carbon tetrafluoride CF4	−1572.71	−888.51	−444.42	−227.67
Trimethylsilanamine (CH3)3SiNH2	Tert-butylamine (CH3)3CNH2	−146.59	28.49	−41.10	−333.47
Silylphosphane PSiH5	Methylphosphane CH5P	22.76	−8.29	604.18	94.68