Question

What are the molecular, ionic and net ionic equations for solid sodium bicarbonate plus nitric acid?

Answer 1

Hint: Attempt this question by understanding the definitions of molecular, ionic and net ionic equations and then write the same for the reaction between sodium bicarbonate with nitric acid. Also try to see if the reactants involved in the reaction can dissociate well or not as it will be useful while writing the ionic and net ionic equation.

Complete answer:
Let us first discuss about the molecular, ionic and net ionic equations as follows:-
-Molecular equation: In a molecular equation, any ionic molecules or compounds are represented as neutral compounds using their chemical formulas without any charge with them. Here we are given sodium bicarbonate and nitric acid as reactant which will show the neutralization reaction as follows:-
$NaHC{O}_3+HN{O}_3\to NaN{O}_3+C{O}_2+H_{2}O$
As we can see, all the reactants used and product formed are written in their neutral form and hence this is the molecular equation.
-Ionic equation: It is just similar to molecular equation but the difference is that an ionic equation is an equation in which the electrolytes in aqueous solution are expressed as dissociated ions. Generally all strong acids and bases and soluble ionic compounds exist as dissociated ions in the aqueous solution.
$NaHC{O}_3$is a strong base and can be expressed as $N{a}^{+}$and $HC{O_3}^{-1}$ions whereas $HN{O}_3$can be expressed as $H^{+}$ and $N{O_3}^{-1}$ions.
So the ionic equation for sodium bicarbonate with nitric acid is:-
$N{a}^{+}+HC{O_3}^{-}+H^{+}+N{O_3}^{-}\to N{a}^{+}+N{O_3}^{-}+C{O}_2+H_{2}O$
-Net ionic equation: It is an equation that shows only the chemical species that are involved in a reaction whereas a complete ionic equation also includes the spectator ions. In the above ionic equation, $N{a}^{+}$ and $N{O_3}^{-1}$ are the spectator ions, so we just need to exclude them to get the net ionic equation as follows:-
$HC{O_3}^{-}+H^{+}\to C{O}_2+H_{2}O$

Note:
-We must always write a balanced chemical equation for solving such questions.
-Neutralization reaction is a reaction between an acid and a base that produces salt and water and sometimes carbon dioxide as well when the base contains a carbonate or a bicarbonate ion.