Ccl2h2 Lewis Structure,Characteristics:13 Must To Know Facts

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CCl2H2 Lewis structure, and other important facts are going to be discussed in this article.

Dichloromethane, CCl2H2 is an organo chlorine compound. It is a colorless liquid which is volatile in nature and has chloroform like sweet smell. It can be used as a good solvent.

How to draw Lewis structure of  Dichloromethane, CCl2H2 ?

Atoms join together to form a stable bond by sharing their electrons. This process can be easily understand by drawing certain simple structures. These structures are called Lewis structure. Generally dots and lines are used to denote electrons and bonds in the Lewis structure.

So the structures designed on the basis of this is called Lewis dot structures.
Before drawing the Lewis structure of dichloromethane we need to understand which of the atoms are present here and their valence electrons.

  • In dichloromethane there is one carbon atom attached with two hydrogen and chlorine.  Now let’s see the valence electrons in dichloromethane. Carbon contains four electrons, hydrogen has one and chlorine has seven electrons in their outer shell. So the total number is 4+1×2+7×2= 20 electrons.
  • In the second step we draw the symbol of carbon atom surrounded with chlorine and hydrogen atoms. Their valence electrons are also indicated here.
ccl2h2 lewis structure
Valence electrons representation in CCl2H2
  • In the third step we show how they share their electrons each other to form the stable bond.
b 3
Lewis structure of CCl2H2

Dichloromethane, CCl2H2  Resonance

When atoms are linked with double bonds and lone pair of electrons, the electrons has a tendency to move across the bonds. This movement cause different structures for one molecule. This process is called resonance and structures are resonating structures.

It is important to maintain the structure of molecule as it is during the movement of electrons. In case of dichloromethane there is no double bond. The lone pair of electrons linked with chlorine atom doesn’t play a role for the making of resonance structure. So there is no resonating structure for dichloromethane.

Dichloromethane, CCl2H2  Shape

When two hydrogen atoms of methane got substituted by chlorine, then forms a compound called dichloromethane. The structure of dichloromethane is found to be tetrahedral. It is due to sp3 hybridization.

c 3
Shape of CCl2H2

Dichloromethane, CCl2H2   Formal charge

The charge assigned to an atom due its  bond making with other atoms termed as formal charge. There is one equation for finding formal charge. It is

Formal charge =( valence electrons – No. of dots – No. of bonds)
The formal charge of four atoms in dichloromethane is

For carbon = (4-0-4) = 0
For chlorine = (7-6-1) = 0
For hydrogen = (1-0-1) = 0

Hence we understood that the formal charge assigned to dichloromethane is zero.

Dichloromethane, CCl2H2   Angle

The bond angle of dichloromethane is 109.5. There is two carbon – chlorine joined and carbon – hydrogen joined bonds are present in dichloromethane. The atoms attached to the central carbon are located on the corners of a tetrahedron.

d 2
Bond angle of CCl2H2

Dichloromethane, CCl2H2   Octet Rule

When there is eight electrons are present in the outermost shell of an atom after bond formation then it is said to be stable. This rule can be called as octet rule. Here carbon and chlorine has eight electrons in the valence shell after bond making. So they fulfill octet rule.

But hydrogen has only two electrons. Certain atoms need not be filled with eight to exist as stable compound. Hydrogen needs only two electrons to remain stable and it is obtained after bond making. So it is stable but don’t obey octet rule due to the absence of eight electrons in its outer shell.

Dichloromethane, CCl2H2  Lone pair of electrons

Sometimes the whole valence electrons doesn’t involve in bond making. So those electrons that has no role in bond making process are called lone pair electron.

There is zero lone pair seen in hydrogen and carbon atom of dichlormethane  but we can see 3 lone pair in the chlorine atom. So in total there is six lone pairs are found in dichloromethane.

Dichloromethane, CCl2H2   Hybridisation

Atomic orbitals with different energy combines to form new set of orbitals with indifferent energy it is termed as hybridization. The new set formed will be equal to the orbitals got united. The speciality of the new orbitals are its identical shape and energy.

Let’s start with the electronic configuration of carbon first because it is the central atom.
Carbon( ground state)  1s2 2s2 2p2

In the next step what happens is the excitation of one electron from 2s to 2p level. Then

Carbon ( excited state) 1s2 2s1 2p3

So these three orbitals that is one 2s and three 2p undergo hybridization to make four sp3 hybrid orbitals. At last the two hydrogen and chlorine atoms distributes their electrons to the central located carbon atom to form dichloromethane. The shape of dichloromethane thus made is tetrahedral with angle 109.50. All the bonds are single bonds and are stable.

e 3
Hybridisation in CCl2H2

Dichloromethane, CCl2H2   Solubility


The capacity of a substance to be dissolved in a given solvent is its solubility. The solubility ability of compounds will be different. Some will be easily soluble in all solvents but some will not. Usually we use water, ethanol, acetone, ether as solvents.
Dichloromethane is not much soluble in water. It can be made water soluble by decreasing temperature of the system. When temperature is 60 then 5.2 g/L get dissolved, at 60 15.8g/L dissolves. But we found out that dichloromethane is soluble in organic solvents like ethyl acetate, ethanol, hexane, benzene,CCl4, ether, chloroform, phenol, aldehydes and ketones.

 Is Dichloromethane, CCl2H2   Ionic or Covalent ?

There are two types of bond, ionic and covalent. First one forms due to attraction between two oppositely charged ions. Latter is because of the mutual distribution of electrons between the atoms.

In dichloromethane there is zero charged ions. All atoms existing here shares their electrons each other to form the compound they want. So they made a covalent bond. So dichloromethane is not at all ionic.

Is Dichloromethane, CCl2H2   Acidic or not ?

Dichloromethane is found to be acidic. It acts a good Lewis acid. A Lewis acid has vaccant orbitals to accept electrons. This compound accepts electrons from other bases. So it is a Lewis acid like substance.

Is Dichloromethane, CCl2H2   polar or not ?

We all know that dichloromethane has one central carbon joined with two chlorine and hydrogen atoms. Here two carbon- chlorine and carbon- hydrogen bonds can be seen. Chlorine atom present here is electronegative in nature. It’s electronegativity is much more than that of carbon and hydrogen.

So there arises a dipole moment difference between the bonds made here. This is almost equal to 1.6 D. So it’s dipole moment value is not zero. This indicates that dichloromethane is found to be a polar molecule.

Summary

Dichloromethane is a organo chlorine compound. Its molecular weight is 84.93g/mol with refractive index 1.42. It is found in wetlands and emitted into atmosphere due to automobile emissions. It is used as a good solvent.

This article describes that dichlormethane is a covalently bonded molecule with polar behaviour which undergo sp3 hybridisation. It acts like a lewis acid and its valence electrons are also mentioned here.

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