Question

Cool! Electra has mastered Equilibrium constants and has moved on to Gibb's energy.
Electra was thinking, "When we calculate the Gibb's energy for a SHE using electrode potential, we get 0.
So is it right to say that this half-cell ‘has no change in Gibb's energy’ ?"
What will you tell her?

• A. It's true Electra
• B. No way, that's wrong
• C. Gibb’s energy cannot be applied here. Foolish Electra.
• D. Half-cells don’t have electrode potential.

Answer 1

The correct option is B No way, that's wrong

Do you remember that we have assigned an electrode potential of 0 just for convenience? This has been done so that we can calculate the electrode potential of other elements relative to this base quantity.
But this does not mean that the absolute value of electrode potential is 0 for the hydrogen electrode. Since $\Delta G^{\circ }=-nF{E}^{\circ },\Delta G$ would also not be 0.