Question

Explain why:
(i) LiCl is predominantly covalent while NaCl is ionic.
(i) Be(OH), is almost insoluble in water while Ba(OH),
is soluble.
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Answer 1

Explanation:

Licl is predominantly covalent because the size of the lithium is so small due to high lattice enthalpy .This is because of the small size of cation and large size of anion in LiCl. Since, the size of cation is small, it's polarising power is large. And since the anion is small, it's polarisability is more.

as beoh exhibit covalent nature while baoh shows ionic nature