<p>I need help with this question.</p>
<p>Which of the following salts will hydrolyze in water to form basic solutions?</p>
<p>I. NaCl
II. CuSO4
III. K3PO4</p>
<p>The answer is III only. Can someone please explain why? Please show why each one is right/wrong!! Thanks, I really need help with this.</p>
<p>BTW, I know the first one is wrong since it becomes NaOH + HCl, and that’s not a basic solution. I don’t know about the other two…</p>
<p>OK after I looked up some stuff on google, I realized that I need to figure out if the salt is formed from a strong base and weak acid. Now… how can I figure that out? I know it involved a neutralization reaction, but can someone tell me how to derive the reaction?</p>
<p>NaCl–>NaOH+HCl (Strong Base and Strong Acid)
CuSO4–>Cu(OH)2+H2SO4 (Weak Base and Strong Acid)
K3PO4–>KOH+H3PO4 (Strong Base and Weak Acid)</p>
<p>Of course, add H2O to your reactants on each of the 3 reactions.</p>
<p>Oh… now I see. Thanks!</p>
<p>CuSO4 becomes</p>
<p>H2SO4, which is a strong base…</p>
<p>^No, H2SO4 is a strong acid. When aqueous, H2SO4 will split into H+ and HSO4-.</p>
<p>oops my bad i meant strong acid, and i thought the question read ‘which of following is an acid’</p>
<p>Just like 314159265 said, the following are what the salts will react with water to form
NaCl + H2O–>NaOH+HCl (Strong Base and Strong Acid)
CuSO4 +H2O–>Cu(OH)2+H2SO4 (Weak Base and Strong Acid)
K3PO4 +H2O–>KOH+H3PO4 (Strong Base and Weak Acid)</p>
<p>You realize that for III since KOH is a strong base, it will dissociate completely and hence there will be an excess of OH- ions which will make the resulting solution basic.</p>