question archive Alkaline earth metals have a valency of 2
Alkaline earth metals have a valency of 2
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Alkaline earth metals have a valency of 2.
Alkaline earth metals are located in group 2 of the , which implies that they each have 2 electrons in their outermost shells.
The electrons located in the outermost shell of an atom are called .
Alkaline earth metals will readily react to give up those two electrons in order to gain a complete , which is characterized by the presence of 8 electrons in the outermost shell.
Berylium is an exception to this; since it doesn't have enough electrons to be able to obtain a complete octet, berylium will lose those two in order to form a stable duet configuration.
The of the group 2 elements reveals the two each of those atoms have.
As you can see, in order to form a complete octet (or duet as mentioned earlier), every one of these atoms will give up the two electrons located in their outermost shells to form 2+ cations.
The valency of the alkaline earth metals is thus said to be 2, meaning that they each have two valence electrons.
