Will distilled water conduct electricity?

Hi, Chris. Please express your question in terms of what has already been said on this page, rather than starting over. But pure water does not conduct electricity and many other objects do, so now you have two reasons to rephrase it :-)    Good luck.

Regards,

Hi, Casie. No liquid will conduct electricity anywhere near as well as copper wire, so it is possible that your bulb is too big or your batteries too small. But try very salty water and, instead of just putting two wires in it, attach sheets of aluminum foil to them as Jeromy from Bellevue, Washington described. Good luck.

Regards,

A. Hi, Sara. Because you are unlikely to find "pure" water and, even if you did, whatever went into the water, whether it be you and or some electrical device, will immediately render the water impure. Saying that pure water doesn't conduct electricity is something for science class not for real life.

Regards,

A. Hi, Susie. Table salt is sodium chloride. Sea salt is largely sodium chloride (NaCl) but will contain traces of other salts, as will aquarium salt. Bleach (NaOCl) is not salt, although you may be right that it can be converted to salt.

I think you are on the right track of trying to search for some relationship rather than just measuring the conductivity of a dozen different things with no organizing principle, but I'd go further. I think the best approach would be to measure the conductivity with varying amounts of sodium chloride added to the water, and graphing the relationship. You can start with distilled water and go all the way from a very tiny pinch of salt in distilled water to a thick paste of salt and water. Hopefully the conductivity vs. the concentration will produce a nice graph that offers some insights. (For example, you may find that the conductivity tops out early on and additional salt has no effect).

Regards,

A. Hi,
I am doing some research on the internet tonight and I stumbled on this website. First, I would like to say the kids on this page are smarter than the kids I knew when I was their age. Secondly, I want to let everyone know that under certain conditions, electricity can pass through any point in space without any medium! For most practical applications this is of no concern but even the conductivity of air is important when it comes to lightning. This phenomena is governed by the permittivity of free space. Materials multiply this effect by their relative permittivity.

Hi, Sela. pH is a measure of hydrogen ion concentration. Plain table salt is NaCl. Why would you expect that adding Na and Cl would affect the amount of hydrogen ion? Good luck.

Regards,

Hi, Simon.

Voltage is not a measure of the electrical current that is flowing, it is a measure of electrical "pressure".

Regards,

A. Well here I am looking up things for an experiment that I just completed in school and I can't believe some of these answers.

I am in grade 9 and I only just did a prac assignment about the salinity level in water and if the level affects the conductivity (electrical current passing through).

We had a beaker of distilled water in a beaker which was attached to a conductivity probe (a device that lets the electricity pass through the water), wires and alligator hooks attaching each end to an ammeter and a variable power supply (battery) then attaching these all together. The conductivity probe had a light on it so we could tell if the current passed through.

We tested this experiment with 6 volts to be safe. The distilled water wouldn't conduct the electricity and we knew this because we took out the probe/water from the circuit and the ammeter reading shot up to 10. Next we changed the bulb to see if it had blown. Still no luck. Then we changed the distilled water to normal room temperature tap water. This didn't work whether so we had to go with that our control test didn't really work.
We added 1 then 2 then 3 tsp of salt and each one came up with a reading on the ammeter, increasing each time. If you want to know more, I'll send you my prac report complete with discussion, I need to finish it first though. Like now. I should be finishing it now.. due tomorrow.. yea... I'm gonna do that now :P

Hope this helped :D
Ella <3

Is it not correct that the current is not actually passing through the liquid but in fact the Na ions are releasing an electron and the Cl ions are taking an electron. There is no actual handoff between the Na and Cl in the liquid. As such, once all the Na and Cl ions have become neutralized, the solution will no longer conduct current. In essence the ions are converted or used up in the process and cease to be ions. At that point, unless additional salt is added, the current flow will cease.

Hi, Doug.

Thanks for joining into the conversation. But, unless I am misunderstanding what you are saying, I don't believe it's accurate. Similar solutions of salts are used in electroplating baths where the salt stays dissolved and conductive for decades. Sodium is far too active a metal, far too anxious to ionize, for us to be able to convert it to sodium metal simply by making an electron available at the cathode.

When NaCl is dissolved into water, it does ionize into Na+ ions and Cl- ions.

Regards,

Ted Mooney, P.E.
Striving to live Aloha
finishing.com - Pine Beach, New Jersey
January 18, 2011

A. Would it not be far more accurate to always state that distilled water is a very poor conductor of electricity? Rather than the absolute statement that distilled water is not a conductor of electricity. I say this because although distilled water acts more as a resistor than a conductor at certain low voltages, it can act as a conductor with a greater voltage. Therefore an absolute claim does not apply.

Hi, Michael. I'm not familiar with the application your uncle is speaking of, but the coolant in some similar applications is oil rather than water. But you could estimate the usual resistance of water and the dimensions and spacing of the wires, and calculate the approximate power consumption due to this partial shorting out.

Regards,

A. Hi, Tom. I can't explain it because I believe your data is unfortunately incorrect. The resistivity of water and most fluids decreases with increasing temperature.

Regards,

A. Hi, Carmen.

HCl will ionize in water to H+ and Cl-. Those charged ions are carrying charge with them as they move. Within limits, how much charge you can convey in a given time will be proportional to how many H+ and Cl- ions you have in the solution. That should pretty much answer the ethanol question too. Good luck.

Regards,

A. You can't make DI water conductive, Kate. You need to use a different type of level indicator, such as a simple float switch.

Regards,

A. Hi, Alex. No, a conductivity test would only indicate the presence of conductive ions. Lots of harmful materials do not ionize. For example, petroleum oil does not conduct electricity, and bacteria and viruses and such are life forms that do not ionize.

Regards,

A. Hi Dena. The bubbles were hydrogen gas. The electricity causes water to separate into either hydrogen gas and hydroxide (OH) ions, or hydrogen gas and oxygen gas. But he needs to re-do the experiment because you guys did not note which of the two charged wires bubbled :-)

It's hard to say what turned the water yellow, but when he redoes it, pour the yellow water through a coffee filter to determine whether the yellow coloration is a dissolved material or a precipitated one. Good luck!

Regards,

A. Hi Catherine. It would not be safe. There are various degrees of distilled water purity, and the electricity could slowly or suddenly gain conductivity from things as simple as salty sweat.

Regards,

Hi John. If you don't know the answer to a question, feel free to research it or ask people to help you. But when you don't understand a question, tell the teacher you don't understand it ... because asking for answers to questions you don't understand will only hamper your education, not help it.

Regards,