Question

Why doesnt a beaker of deionized water conduct electricity?

When the apparatus is placed in glacial acetic acid are any ions present in the solution?

After the glacial acetic acid is mixed with water,are there ions present? how do you know?

Answer 1

a)

normally; water will NOT conduct electricity. "common" water or "dirty" water contains salts and minerals that will be in ionic/aquous solution, i.e. Na+; Mg+2; CO3-2 etc...

Those ions let electrons flow through. If we deionize (take out all ions) then we do not have ions that will let electrons flow. Therefore deionized water cant conduct electricity

b)

Glacial Acid is "water free" acetic acid; it is a SOLID; therefore it contains no aqueous ions in solution. It will; when in contact with water, form aqueous solution of Acetic acid (H+ and Acetate ion- )

c)

Yes, as shown before, the solid HA will enter in the solution as H+ and Ac- (partially, not 100%)

This equilibrium is described with Ka (acid equilibrium) and is approx 3% in solution.

The pH will drop to 2-3 since the H+ ion concnetration is High; therefore

pH = -log(H+) drops!