4a.5 Reversible expansion and work

[Anastasia Yulo 1C]

A piston confines 0.200mol Ne(g) in 1.20L at 25 degrees Celsius. Two experiments are performed:
a.) The gas is allowed to expand through an additional 1.20L against a constant pressure of 1.00 atm

b.) The gas is allowed to expand reversibly and isothermally to the same final volume

which process does more work?

The answer is b, but I don't understand why.

[Chem_Mod]

Rewatch the lectures on reversible vs irreversible expansion. In reversible expansion, the gas is expanding against the maximum pressure it can expand against at each step. W= -PdV, so maximum pressure means maximum work. Vs in irreversible expansion, the gas expands against a smaller external pressure, resulting in less work done

[Jacob Schwarz-Discussion 3I]

In Lavelle's lecture, he talks about reversible expansion using maximum work whereas irreversible expansion expands instantly and doesn't use as much work(it also isn't as efficient)