Simple Procedure for writing Lewis Structures – Lewis Structures for Nitrogen Oxychloride NOCl - Example #9

A simple procedure for writing Lewis structures is given in a previous article entitled “Lewis Structures and the Octet Rule”. Relevant worked examples were given in the following articles: Examples #1, #2, #3 and #4, #5, #6,  #7,  #8.

Another example  for writing Lewis structures following the above procedure is given bellow:

Let us consider the case of Nitrogen Oxychloride  NOCl  

Nitrogen Oxychloride is a yellow gas. It is used in synthesis of pharmaceutical products (chlorinated agent).

Step 1:  The central atom will be the N atom since it is the less electronegative. Connect the atoms with single bonds:

 Step 2: Calculate the # of electrons in πbonds (multiple bonds) using  formula (1) in the article entitled “Lewis Structures and the Octet Rule”. 

Where n in this case is 3 since  NOCl consists of three atoms.

Where V = (5 + 6 +7 ) = 18  

Therefore, P = 6n + 2 – V = 6 * 3 + 2 – 18 = 2     So,   there are 2 π electrons in NOCl _.

Step 3 & 4: Therefore, the Lewis structures for NOCl  are as follows:

Figure 1: Lewis structures for NOCl. Resonace structure 1 is the most plausible since there is no charge separation.