Wednesday, March 06, 2002
10:22:07 AM Arizona Time
Hello to all on the list:
        The Chorine is the question I have so I did go to "Ask Jeeves" and after a
short search I did find this amount of information dealing with this
chemical element. http://www.webelements.com/  This web site is in England
or Great Britain  it has all that you would need to look up elements on the
Periodic Table.
Chlorine is an Element on the Periodic table of Elements, symbol CL, has an
atomic weight of 35.453 , Atomic Number of  17   and is a gas in its natural
state. Chlorine is a disinfectant as a posin to living things and that
includes microbes. Handling it in a gaseous state is dangerous and extreme
caution is advised.
        The real reason for the use in tap water is to keep it clean while it's in
the water mains not so much for the people who use it. The delivery of clean
water is up to the water company in your area and they must comply with what
is expected of them. However in some cases the chemistry fails when
confronted to certain water contaminations of portable water. In the case of
the water supply in Milwaukee circa 1990's. The water company in that case
was doing good to remove the contaminates until they got ecolie bacteria in
the public water system.
        Chlorine is a greenish yellow gas which combines directly with nearly all
elements. Chlorine is a respiratory irritant. The gas irritates the mucous
membranes and the liquid burns the skin. As little as 3.5 p.p.m. can be
detected as an odor, and 1000 p.p.m. is likely to be fatal after a few deep
breaths. It was used as a war gas in 1915. It is not found in a free state
in nature, but is found commonly as NaCl (solid or seawater).
* production of safe drinking waters the world over. Even the smallest water
supplies are now usually chlorinated
* extensively used in the production of paper products, dye stuffs,
textiles, petroleum products, medicines, antiseptics, insecticides,
foodstuffs, solvents, paints, plastics, and many other consumer products
* most chlorine is used in the manufacture of chlorinated cleaning
compounds, pulp bleaching, disinfectants, and textile processing
* manufacture of chlorates, chloroform, carbon tetrachloride
* used for the extraction of bromine
* PVC pipe used to provide safe drinking water
The bleach is of course not what it appears to be. Note that it doesn't
appear in a natural state but that of a compound. NaCl is salt and from that
it returns when exposed to evaporation of water. The bonds of the salt
 NaCl) are ionic and are some of the strongest in nature and that is why you
don't get poised by it. In Household bleach it would be in the form of
Chlorates. It is considered to be a "base" as the above says "non-metal" but
it does have some redeeming uses for man in the area of an antiseptic.
        (MPOV) This scares me to death and perhaps my bees if they could think and
read this. It is used as an insecticide as well so beware as I don't think
that I would use it under and circumstances. I don't use chemicals and/or
antibiotics or essential oils in my hive at any time. Use the fermented
honey to make mead if you think it would be useful than feed it to your bees
and don't harvest any honey unless it's capped.
Respectfully submitted
Harvey
Tucson, Arizona