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Topic: Dissociation of polyprotic acid  (Read 1886 times)

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Offline neon

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Dissociation of polyprotic acid
« on: April 09, 2014, 11:12:36 PM »
What are the concentrations of H+, H2C2O4, HC2O4- and C2O42- in a 0.1 M solution of oxalic acid. K1=10-2 M and K2 = 10-5

H2C2O4  ::equil::  H+ + HC2O4-
0.1-x           x+y         x

HC2O4-  ::equil:: H+ +  C2O42-
x-y             x+y        y

[itex]K_1 = \dfrac{x(x+y)}{0.1-x} [/itex]

Neglecting x from denominator and y from numerator, I get x=0.031 which is incorrect. Can anyone help? I'm really dumb at ionic equilibrium.  ???

Offline Borek

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Re: Dissociation of polyprotic acid
« Reply #1 on: April 10, 2014, 02:55:19 AM »
Ka2 is three orders of magnitude lower than Ka1, you can safely assume second dissociation doesn't matter for pH.
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