{"id":238074,"date":"2025-06-17T20:03:56","date_gmt":"2025-06-17T20:03:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/learnexams.com\/blog\/?p=238074"},"modified":"2025-06-17T20:03:58","modified_gmt":"2025-06-17T20:03:58","slug":"determine-the-formal-charge-on-the-chlorine-atom-in-the-hypochlorite-ion-clo-and-the-perchlorate-ion-clo4-if-the-cl-atom-has-an-octet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/2025\/06\/17\/determine-the-formal-charge-on-the-chlorine-atom-in-the-hypochlorite-ion-clo-and-the-perchlorate-ion-clo4-if-the-cl-atom-has-an-octet\/","title":{"rendered":"Determine the formal charge on the chlorine atom in the hypochlorite ion ClO- and the perchlorate ion, ClO4-, if the Cl atom has an octet"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p> Determine the formal charge on the chlorine atom in the hypochlorite ion ClO- and the perchlorate ion, ClO4-, if the Cl atom has an octet. b. What are the oxidation numbers of chlorine in ClO- and ClO4-? c. What are the essential differences in the definitions of formal charge and oxidation number that lead to the differences in your answers to part (a) and (b)?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><mark style=\"background-color:rgba(0, 0, 0, 0)\" class=\"has-inline-color has-ast-global-color-1-color\">The Correct Answer and Explanation is:<\/mark><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>a. Formal Charge Calculation<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To determine the formal charge (FC) of chlorine in each ion, we use the formula:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Formal charge = (Valence electrons) \u2013 (Nonbonding electrons) \u2013 \u00bd(Bonding electrons)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>For ClO\u207b (hypochlorite ion):<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Assume the Lewis structure has:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Cl single bonded to O<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>One lone pair on Cl<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>3 lone pairs on O<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>One extra electron due to the negative charge<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Chlorine (Cl) has 7 valence electrons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Cl has:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>2 nonbonding electrons<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>2 bonding electrons with O<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>FC = 7 \u2013 2 \u2013 \u00bd(2) = 7 \u2013 2 \u2013 1 = <strong>+4<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But this is not realistic. For ClO\u207b, a more reasonable Lewis structure shows Cl with 6 electrons around it (3 lone pairs) and one single bond to O.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So FC = 7 \u2013 6 \u2013 \u00bd(2) = 7 \u2013 6 \u2013 1 = <strong>0<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>For ClO\u2084\u207b (perchlorate ion):<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Assume Cl is in the center with four double bonds to four oxygens. Each O has two lone pairs. Total electrons: 7 (from Cl) + 4\u00d76 (from O) + 1 (extra for negative charge) = 32 electrons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Each double bond = 4 bonding electrons<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>FC = 7 \u2013 0 \u2013 \u00bd(8) = 7 \u2013 0 \u2013 4 = <strong>+3<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>b. Oxidation Numbers<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>In ClO\u207b:<\/strong><br>Oxygen = \u20132<br>Overall charge = \u20131<br>So Cl + (\u20132) = \u20131 \u2192 Cl = <strong>+1<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>In ClO\u2084\u207b:<\/strong><br>O = \u20132 \u00d7 4 = \u20138<br>Cl + (\u20138) = \u20131 \u2192 Cl = <strong>+7<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>c. Explanation of Differences<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The difference between formal charge and oxidation number lies in how electrons are assigned:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Formal charge<\/strong> assumes equal sharing of bonding electrons, so shared electrons are divided equally between the two atoms.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Oxidation number<\/strong> assumes ionic sharing, where bonding electrons are given entirely to the more electronegative atom.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Because of this, formal charges often show less extreme values, while oxidation numbers reflect complete electron transfer and may appear larger or smaller in magnitude. This explains why chlorine has a formal charge of 0 or +3, but oxidation numbers of +1 and +7 in these ions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/learnexams-banner8-980.jpeg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-238075\"\/><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Determine the formal charge on the chlorine atom in the hypochlorite ion ClO- and the perchlorate ion, ClO4-, if the Cl atom has an octet. b. What are the oxidation numbers of chlorine in ClO- and ClO4-? c. What are the essential differences in the definitions of formal charge and oxidation number that lead to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-238074","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-exams-certification"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238074","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=238074"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238074\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=238074"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=238074"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=238074"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}