Three Questions

Recently I have finished the test, the latest homework, and lots of labs! In so doing, I have learned about the mathematics involved in the labs, and solving problems related to solubility, redox reactions, and volumetric analysis. Next I  plan to put the finishing touches on my labs for Monday, and finish the glog on my book! 

Titration... in real life

So just for a second pretend you are Robert Angus Smith. Its 1852 and you are studying air pollution in an age marked by the growth of industry.

You live in Scotland, which just happens to be the place famous for having the most acid rain ever.  That would be a subject of scientific interest, I mean, its only sulfuric acid pouring from the sky, right? But you jump right in and begin your investigation. I mean, who wouldn't want to know why 109.16 grams of sulfuric anhydride would ever be in the position to contaminate every single gallon of rainwater. 

After all of your pioneering research you publish a book called air and rain, in which you formally begin your own field of research, chemical climatology.

 Then you go down in history as the father of acid rain, which does sound pretty bad when you think about it, I mean, acid rain has pretty volatile effects on ecosystems, but we won’t get into that, the poor guy only coined the term, after all.

Now pretend you are a modern day chemical climatologist, and you study the ideas brought about by guys like our friend Robert. Being a chemical climatologist, you  say you want to study the acidity and composition of the rainwater, contaminated or otherwise in the immediate area. Now you are studying how precipitaion responds to an increase in output of air pollutants by industry, or something similar. After using ion exchange chromatography to analyze your samples for various ions, you then set out to identify the degree of contamination. Immediately, you think of everything you learned about titration and how it can give you information on the proportions of chemicals in solution. After identifying sulfuric acid in the solution, you titrate it to neutrality with sodium hydroxide. By finding out how much sodium hydroxide is necessary, you can figure the degree to which the rainwater is contaminated. 

                                               

Picture from http://amcheminfo.blogspot.com/
From this, it is absolutely clear that titration is essential in the environmental sciences. For the same purpose, it is also used in waste water analysis, though a bit more elaborately, for the same purpose. Figuring the extent of contamination. In this case to meet standards. 

As a method of chemical analysis, titration has a clear and straightforward purpose. It tells us about a solution, and as we have seen, that can be absolutely vital. 

Sources

http://www.titrations.info/acid-base-titration-sulfuric-acid

http://www.people.carleton.edu/~bhaileab/environmentalgeology/RainWater.pdf

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ion_chromatography

http://archive.org/stream/airrainbeginning00smitiala#page/234/mode/2up

http://ca.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100308180158AA7Z2Vo

http://cpe.njit.edu/dlnotes/CHE685/Cls06-1.pdf