Question

Aditya remembered that Sodium shouldn’t be stored in water and so he used ethanol to store sodium. He observed that sodium disappeared to give a yellow powder. What is this yellow powder?

• A. Baking powder
• B. Sodium carbonate
• C. Sodium ethoxide
• D. Sodium hydroxide

Answer 1

The correct option is C

Sodium ethoxide

The question given above is an

ACID + METAL reaction. Ethanol in the

presence of metals acts as an acid.

so, the acid here is ethanol and the metal

is sodium. All metals liberate hydrogen

on reacting with acids.

Ethanol reacts with sodium leading to the

evolution of hydrogen and sodium ethoxide.

Sodium ethoxide is fine a yellow powder.
$2Na+C{H}_{3}C{H}_{2}OH\to 2C{H}_{3}C{H}_2{O}^{-}N{a}^{+}+H_2$