[1][2][3][4][5] The experiment is a form of coulometry which generally employs a three electrode system controlled by a potentiostat.
In the experiment the working electrode is held at a constant potential (volts) and current (amps) is monitored over time (seconds).
The results of a bulk electrolysis are visually displayed as the total coulombs passed (total electric charge) plotted against time in seconds, even though the experiment measures electric current (amps) over time.
In such situations there is concern that the analyte and trace redox products may interact with the reference electrode and either render it useless or increase drift.
In contrast, a bulk electrolysis involves currents greater by several orders of magnitude.
This means much of the redox chemistry will occur at the points at either end of the shortest path between the working and auxiliary electrode.
Bulk electrolysis is occasionally cited in the literature as means to study electrochemical reaction rates.
However, bulk electrolysis is generally a poor method to study electrochemical reaction rates since the rate of bulk electrolysis is generally governed by the specific cells ability to perform mass transfer.
For example, if one molecule of hydrogen results from every two electrons inserted into an acidic solution then the faradaic efficiency would be 100%.
This factor must be considered when analyzing the current passed and when attempting to do further analysis/isolation/experiments with the substrate solution.