Question

Give suitable chemical terms for

A salt formed by incomplete neutralization of an acid by a base?

Answer 1

• Acid Salts are salts formed by incomplete neutralization of an acid by a base.
• In this, bases react with polybasic acids like H₂SO₄.
• Polybasic means acids that are capable of yielding more than one hydrogen ion(H₃O⁺) ions.
• H₂SO₄ dissociates into two steps. i.e. two hydronium ions produce.

H₂SO₄ (aq) + H₂O(aq) ⇢ H₃O⁺ (aq) + HSO₄^- (aq)

HSO₄^- (aq) + H₂O(aq) ⇢ H₃O⁺ (aq) + SO₄^2- (aq)

Example

• When sodium chloride(NaCl) reacts with sulphuric acid (H₂SO₄) the products are sodium bisulphate and hydrochloric acid.
• NaCl (s) + H₂SO₄ (aq) $\stackrel{\mathrm{heat}}{\to }$ NaHSO₄(salt) + HCl(aq)
• Only the first step of dissociating acid takes place to form Sodiumbisulphate.
• Here incomplete neutralization of acid takes place.