Why is carbon dioxide a non-polar molecule?

1 Answer
anor277
Jan 8, 2016

Molecular polarity arises from the vector sum of the individual bond-dipoles.

Explanation:

For each C=O bond we could draw a vector representing bond polarity →, where the arrow points to the negative end. Because carbon dioxide is linear, these dipoles sum up to zero, and the carbon dioxide molecule is non-polar.

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