Question

38 The boiling points, at standard pressure, of four compounds are given in the table below.CompoundBoiling Point (oC)H2O100.0H2S-59.6H2Se-41.3H2Te-2.0

What type of attraction can be used to explain the unusually high boiling point of H2O?
(1) ionic bonding
(2) hydrogen bonding
(3) polar covalent bonding
(4) nonpolar covalent bonding

Answer 1

Hydrogen bonding! Each hydrogen atom with a high charge density forms bonds with lone pairs on oxygen atoms. These bonds require a lot of energy to break giving water a relatively high boiling point.