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Carbonic acid, as well as bicarbonate and carbonate anions, are abundant in the

ID: 898797 • Letter: C

Question

Carbonic acid, as well as bicarbonate and carbonate anions, are abundant in the ocean, and pay a fundamental role in the ocean with respect to balancing carbon dioxide (CO_2) in the environment, and specifically acts to effectively "absorb" CO_2 from the atmosphere. As such, one of the consequences of increased CO_2 in the atmosphere is increased ocean acidification. Carbonic acid, H_2CO_3, is a diprotic acid that dissociates, losing its two protons, into bicarbonate, HCO_3^-, and carbonate, CO_3^2-, according to the following two step reaction. As a diprotic system, it has two dissociation constants, and specifically pH_a1 = 6.3 and pK_a2 = 10.3, for these two steps. You titrate a 50.0 mL solution 0.50 M H_2CO_3 with a 1.00 M solution of the strong base, NaOH. What are the two expected equivalence volumes for your titration?

Explanation / Answer

50 ml , 0.5 M H2CO3 with 1 .0 M NaOH

1)

at first equivalence volume of NaOH = 12.5 ml

at second equivalence volume of NaOH = 25 ml

explanation :

at equivace point 1 :

moles of acid = moles of base

25 x 0.5   = 1.0 x V

V = 12.5 ml

at equivalence point 2 :

moles of acid = 2 x moles of base

50 x 0.5 = V x 1.0

V = 25 ml

2 )

H2CO3 + OH-   ----------------> HCO3 -   + H2O

50 x 0.5       30 x 1                       0               0

25                   30                           0              0

0                       5                           25              0

strong base OH- remained in the solution . so pH can be decided by strong base

[OH-] = millimoles / total volume

              = 5 / (50 + 30)

              = 5/ 80

               = 0.0625

pOH = -log[0.0625]

pOH = 1.2

pH +pOH = 14

pH = 12.8