Water and electricity can be a dangerous combination for a person. People are quick to jump out of the pool during a thunderstorm and careful when using electronics in the bathroom. This is because water is so good at conducting electricity – or rather the ions dissolved within are.
What is Electricity and How Does it Travel?
Understanding how electricity travels will help answer the question “Does distilled water conduct electricity?” As the California Energy Commission explains in its Energy Quest page “Chapter 2: What is electricity?” understanding this phenomenon starts with understanding the atom. When an atom has an uneven number of protons and electrons it has a charge – a positive charge when it has more protons and a negative charge with more electrons. Atoms prefer to have a neutral charge and will swap electrons to become neutral. As electrons are passed from one atom to another a flow of electricity is created.
Why Distilled Water Does Not Conduct Electricity
Distilled water is water purified of any contaminants and pure water does not conduct electricity according to Stanley E. Manahan’s book “Fundamentals of environmental chemistry”. This is because an H2O molecule has no charge and no need to swap electrons. However, salt water is considered a good electricity conductor and this is due to the ions within it.
How Salt Water Conducts Electricity
Electrolytes are the substances within water that conduct electricity. Electrolytes are charged ions that can be formed from salts, acids, or bases. Substances such as sugar do not ionized and thus do not conduct electricity. Manahan describes how when salt, NaCl, is added to water it completely ionizes into a positively charged sodium ion, Na+, and a negatively charged chloride ion, Cl -. It is these ions that conduct electricity by passing electrons from one atom to another.
Tap Water Also Conducts Electricity
Tap water doesn’t taste salty but it still conducts electricity. This is because tap water isn’t pure either. The water from the kitchen sink often has trace minerals in it such as calcium, Ca2+, and magnesium, Mg2+. Poland Spring, which unfortunately comes in plastic, boasts having a variety of minerals in their water on their website under “Our sources”. These include calcium, sodium, chloride, and potassium. Poland Spring says these minerals help give their bottled water its special taste. Which is just to say that not all water is the same nor will all waters conduct electricity at the same rate.
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