Coupled diffusion produced by hydrolysis of aqueous potassium phosphate

Conductimetric and diaphragm cell techniques have been used to measure diffusion of aqueous potassium phosphate solutions at 25°C from 0.01 to 0.10 mol-dm^–3 (M). A significant portion of the aqueous K₃PO₄ component diffuses as equimolar amounts of potassium hydrogen phosphate and potassium hydroxide produced by hydrolysis: K₃PO₄+H₂O=K₂HPO₄+KOH. Because OH^– diffuses more rapidly than HPO ₄ ^2– , the total flow of KOH exceeds the flow of K₂HPO₄. The extra flow of KOH constitutes coupled transport of a second solute component. Ternary diffusion coefficients that describe interacting flows of K₃PO₄ and KOH components are reported. At low concentrations where phosphate is strongly hydrolyzed, the molar flux of the KOH component produced by diffusion of K₃PO₄ is six times larger than the flux of the K₃PO₄ component. Binary diffusion coefficients for aqueous K₂HPO₄ solutions are also reported. It is shown that ternary transport coefficients for K₃PO₄ solutions can be estimated from the properties of binary solutions of K₂HPO₄ and KOH.