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Bonding-Pair Lone-Pair Repulsion

Lone pairs affect the bond angle.Bonding pairs are attracted by both nuclei of the atoms forming the covalent bond but lone pairs are attracted only by the atom they belong to.Consequently the molecular orbital is much broader and the repulsion between lone pairs and lone pairs (lp-lp repulsion) or lone pairs and bonding pairs (lp-bp repulsion) is greater than repulsion between bonding pairs and bonding pairs (bp-bp repulsion).For each lone pair the bond angles are reduced by approximately 2.5°.

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Specification: AQA Chemistry (7404), AS-level, 3.1.3.5 Shapes of simple molecules and ions. Topic: Bonding.

Key terms in this lesson

Atomic orbital
A region in space around the nucleus where there is a 95% probability of finding an electron of a given energy.
Covalent bond
A strong electrostatic attraction between a shared pair of electrons and the nuclei of the bonded atoms.
Lone pair
A pair of outer-shell electrons that is not involved in bonding.

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