Mixing household bleach with urine

[lightarrow]

One note on this I can add through personal experience in cleaning up cat urine with bleach, which I found interesting...there is an immediate chemical reaction both in foaming and in production of heat, as witnessed by pouring bleach on a puddle of cat urine. Also there is gas production, obviously, I noted that, but in a well-ventilated area it was not overpowering. However, I found the production of heat to be the interesting part of it. In looking up info on this, I found the reference to Hydrazine intriguing...could a weaker version of this be what is being liberated.

Chemistry was never my strong point, as I'm sure is obvious, but I am interested by the chemical processes.

Releasing of heat is a very common effect in chemical reactions because what usually drives them is just the decreasing of enthalpy. I don't think hydrazine was generated.

 

[mudtoe]

This is a very interesting thread.

My cat has a bad habit of peeing on the floor next to the litter box instead of in it, about every other time. She has done this since she was a kitten and no amount of switching types of litter or types of litter boxes has ever helped. As such, her litter box is in the basement in an area under the stairs where it's just bare concrete under the box instead of upstairs where her messes would be a problem. I've been regularly pouring full strength bleach on the concrete floor where she has peed in order to get rid of the smell for the past couple of years. I figured that it worked so well because the bleach was reacting with the ammonia and chemically neutralizing it (I do this only once a day, so the urine has had ample time to degrade into ammonia). As another poster mentioned, the area fizzes and heat is released in addition to what smells like chlorine gas. I have to leave the area for a little while if a large quantity of urine was deposited on the floor due to the chlorine gas, but after an hour or two it dissipates (I'm assuming that the CL gas is quickly reacting with the surrounding air and being converted into something less reactive, which is why the smell only lasts an hour or two, even in a closed house). The cat is smart enough not to step in the area on the floor that's been treated, and apparently after it dries nothing harmful is left, as she has walked on dried areas without apparent effect. Also, as someone else noted it looks like some white crystalline precipitate is left after the reaction is finished and the water evaporates. Every couple of months I completely clean out the area with some other cleaner that doesn't contain ammonia in order to remove the precipitate.

I'm curious as to what the gas is if it's not chlorine (someone in this thread thought that the gas was something else), and I'm wondering what the precipitate is (could it be salt?). If someone here works in a university and has access to a lab I'd be happy to send them a sample of the precipitate for analysis. That might help answer the question about whether anything dangerous is being left behind after the reaction is complete.

mudtoe

 

[chem geek]

I had mentioned that the smell could be nitrogen trichloride which is very volatile and very smelly and irritating. It is produced when chlorine (hypochlorous acid) and ammonia mix (see Jafvert & Valentine 1992). It is pungent. Chlorine gas (and hypochlorous acid which can also be gaseous) smells more like bleach which is a "cleaner" smell though if strong enough in strength can also be irritating, but given the high pH of bleach (sodium hypochlorite), I doubt that chlorine gas was the main product.

There are also other chloramines, including monochloramine and dichloramine, that are produced as well. When I run a simulation at the high pH of bleach, the predominant product is monochloramine, so perhaps that is what you smell though dichloramine is also produced in significant quantities and it is more volatile than monochloramine. I was probably wrong about the nitrogen trichloride since at high pH not much of it is produced.

Richard

 

[mudtoe]

Hmmm... very interesting. The smell is actually just like bleach, as people who come in the house in the hour or so after I've done it ask if I've been using bleach. However, I don't see any green gas, and I remember from my mad scientist youth days one time pouring bleach, ammonia, and hot water down the sewer drain in the basement, and a green gas actually came out! (needless to say I made a hasty exit from the basement and fortunately nobody else was home at the time)

mudtoe

 

[Borek]

You need realtively high concentration of chlorine to be able to see its color. If you smell the bleach, there is chlorine in the air. But as highly reactive it won't last long - it will react with vitrtually everything in the house (say - it slowly decolorizes carpeting, or your favorite coat).

--

 

[mudder]

Hello everyone,

Not that I looking to experiment or anything, but anyway...correct me if I'm wrong anywhere here...please.

An associate of mine was wondering how to get rid of cat urine smell. Having exhausted all attempts to cover it up or use that enzyme stuff, I told him I usually treat the offending area(because I have 3 cats, I know)with a solution of household bleach. The ensuing reaction liberates a lot of chlorine gas and that he should leave the area for a short time as chlorine gas is very irritating. (I do this all the time, and my kitties love me)
A friend strongly advised him not to mix bleach with urine because urine has ammonia in it. And the gas is toxic and will kill you.

Well first off I don't think urine has ammonia in it because urine is acidic. (Uric acid). The ammonia you smell from a cat's litter box is from the decomposition of the nitrogen rich by-products of metabolism. Correct so far?

Secondly the gas is chlorine because sodium hypochlorite is an oxidizer and it gives up it's oxygen in the process and liberates chlorine as a by-product.

Third the reaction is also somewhat of a typical acid-base reaction because bleach has a high ph and urine has a low ph.

I don't think I'm too far off base with the description of the reaction, or the origin of that ammonia smell, am I??
Please someone correct me if I'm wrong.

Also just out of curiosity, what would be the final products of a reaction with an oxidizer like sodium hypochlorite and uric acid and urea?
Carbon dioxide, water, sodium chloride. hmmmmm...where does all that nitrogen go??

Also what would the result of mixing ammonia and bleach? Hmmmm...?
I know it doesn't smell good, but do they even react?

Thanx for looking

Jim

The acid in the urine is what makes the bleach/ammonia mixture more volatile. mixing ammonia with bleach is not a good idea, unless in a controlled situation. When you add acid from urine is when chlorine gas begins to form more rapidly. When done in a well vented area, no harm done. When done within closed doors, it creates possibility for permanent injury or death. Most people would leave the area from sheer irritation before this would happen, but people have died in this manner.

 

[mudder]

especially with large quantities of partially dried animal urine

 

[thomas.beeler]

There's a better way than using clorox to get rid of the urine smell. Clorox also damages carpets irreparably. Household bleach might work if you're ready to evacuate the house for a day or so while the chlorine gas dissipates. Otherwise you can neutralize the smell with an H2O2 peroxide solution bought at the grocery store. You can tell if it's (the peroxide) reacting with the urine if it begins to foam slowly after a minute or so. When you treat a urine-stained carpet with peroxide, it will also make a soft bubbly sound after a minute (hold your ear close). As long as it bubbles you need to keep treating the carpet. Then dry the carpet with a vacuum and towels.

I once 'rescued' a pet infested house by treating all of the floors with 25 gallons of clorox over a period of a week. It was highly unpleasant but the house increased in value by 125% when I was finished. I didn't die either.

 

[asoto1964]

I cannot believe that after reading all of these responses, and maybe I just missed it, but not one person mentioned "Mustard Gas." Mixing Bleach with Ammonia, or Urine (Animal or Human) which contains Ammonia, creates a homemade version of mustard gas. This stuff is not military grade mustard gas, but it is the closest one can come to creating this biological terror gas at home. In fact, mixing bleach with urine, ammonia, vinegar should not be done unless you're MacGuyver or some grunt in the trenches, who just happens to have all the ingredients necessary to make this weapon -and needs to make it! Bottom line... Don't mess with this stuff!

 

[dreiter]

I cannot believe that after reading all of these responses, and maybe I just missed it, but not one person mentioned "Mustard Gas." Mixing Bleach with Ammonia, or Urine (Animal or Human) which contains Ammonia, creates a homemade version of mustard gas. This stuff is not military grade mustard gas, but it is the closest one can come to creating this biological terror gas at home. In fact, mixing bleach with urine, ammonia, vinegar should not be done unless you're MacGuyver or some grunt in the trenches, who just happens to have all the ingredients necessary to make this weapon -and needs to make it! Bottom line... Don't mess with this stuff!

I think nobody has mentioned it because there are rules against posting about how to make dangerous chemical combinations, especially weaponized chemical compounds.

 

[Borek]

I think nobody mentioned that, because it has nothing to do with the mustard gas.

 

[asoto1964]

Why not mention it? That is exactly what it is... Check anywhere on the internet, and you can verify that mixing any of these chemicals will absolutely produce a "homemade" grade of this lethal gas. It's just ironic to me because when I hear "Bleach & Ammonia" I automatically think mustard gas. And I did some checking... Most people I asked, when I mentioned, bleach and ammonia automatically thought mustard gas too. It is just strange to me that on a forum where there are so many people that I would consider intelligent, no one would call it that -or at the very least make mention of its biological uses and clear potential for danger as a gas. And, it's like I said before... I am not saying this combination is military grade, but it is a lesser, but still very toxic, version of what the military produces. Listen friend, this hits me close to home because these components nearly killed me some years back. I still suffer from the affects of the combination of these chemicals. I solemnly believe that promoting the dangers of these chemicals, even if only when mixed when urine is present, will definitely save lives.

 

[Borek]

Mixing ammonia and bleach can produce chloramines, not a mustard gas.

 

[michaelc187]

I use about 10 percent bleach in water; using it
for the shower since college

my problem isn't getting rid of the smell, but how to keep them from coming back?

the ten percent stuff is a lot more safe, i spray it on my hang down curtains -without worrying about color or smell.

 

[Stopik]

This is officially my favorite forum thread from the entire internet of all times.

 

[Stopik]

Why not mention it? That is exactly what it is... Check anywhere on the internet, and you can verify that mixing any of these chemicals will absolutely produce a "homemade" grade of this lethal gas. It's just ironic to me because when I hear "Bleach & Ammonia" I automatically think mustard gas. And I did some checking... Most people I asked, when I mentioned, bleach and ammonia automatically thought mustard gas too. .

Mustard gas is actually made from sulfur mustards. Specifically mixing sulfur dichloride with ethylene (among a few other methods). Bleach is a chlorite so I can understand the confusion. However anyone stupid enough to mix bleach and ammonia deserves the "chlorinating of the gene pool" that would result. Wait, I just remembered I did the exact same thing when I was nine because my chemistry set told me not to do it. Fair enough.

 

[Ath]

Sodium Bicarbonate (Baking Soda) should help.

Just rub the dry powder into the offending areas.

 

[Histo-Cat]

I have asked about 10 different people the question. I came close on a few people
(VETS) from all the organic chemisty they take, but no one really knew what was really being created in the reaction. One got it right for the Acid Base reaction... if that is still true..
I clean up after my cats in the basement of my house, sort of a small area- as I have on problem cat.. she is now better on Prozac... But I would pour the thick type of bleach on the urine. Then mop up the accident. Sometime the reaction would be so bad, my eyes would start watering, my chest would get tight. I could hardly breath. Then I would stumble out of the area and wonder what the heck is going on?
I stopped using such large amounts, but it was so cheap.
So, Mustard Gas... that is hard to believe. Thanks so much the answer!

 

[Athiril]

Sounds like chlorine gas.

 

[DDTea]

I truly don't understand why people perpetuate the myth that chlorine + ammonia --> mustard. It's simply not true. Besides, if you were exposed to mustard, you'd have the tell-tale blisters to show afterward. Sulfur mustards are prepared by chlorinating thiodiglycol or by reaction of ethylene and sulfur dichloride. If you need further evidence, look at the structure of the reactants and products: Mustards (whether sulfur, nitrogen, or other derivatives) ALL have carbon chains in them. Neither Cl2 nor NH3 have any carbon whatsoever in them. Mustard agents are not things that can be prepared "accidentally" and the precursors involved are regulated under the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention (although some do appear in household products).

Just because it's not mustard doesn't mean the vapors produced aren't dangerous. Besides being toxic, the chloramines and hydrazine (under the right conditions) produced are carcinogenic.

There are also other chloramines, including monochloramine and dichloramine, that are produced as well. When I run a simulation at the high pH of bleach, the predominant product is monochloramine, so perhaps that is what you smell though dichloramine is also produced in significant quantities and it is more volatile than monochloramine. I was probably wrong about the nitrogen trichloride since at high pH not much of it is produced.

Richard

bingo.

 

[chemisttree]

I'm thinking that someone somewhere said (posted on the Internet) that you could make your own version of mustard gas (tearing, choking nastiness) by mixing these two together. Then someone else came along that didn't know the chemistry of mustards and just assumed that "what they saw on the Internet" was to be taken literally.

Thanks, Al Gore! Now go screw up something else...

 

[Nicodemus]

I'm thinking that someone somewhere said (posted on the Internet) that you could make your own version of mustard gas (tearing, choking nastiness) by mixing these two together. Then someone else came along that didn't know the chemistry of mustards and just assumed that "what they saw on the Internet" was to be taken literally.

Thanks, Al Gore! Now go screw up something else...

The nice thing about home chemists of the uneducated and criminal variety is the same as that with bomb-makers: generally poor outcomes.

 

[mspiegelman]

So...very interesting thread, and while I'm not sure of the components...would relay the following, which I fully realize makes me look like a fool. Regardless, the "reaction" was not benign.

2 dogs left in their room for maybe 8 hours max. Golden Retrievers...approx 40kg each.
Only provide this info so you can approx the max urine output. Cannot imagine it would be more then maybe 800cc.

Came home...they obviously have had an accident, but must have been hours as the result had dried into a sticky mess. Thus, obviously concentrated.

Like a fool, grabbed the closest cleaning agent (bleach)...and poured onto the mess WITHOUT diluting.

Instant violent reaction...and the resultant gas put me down quickly...QUICKLY. My eyes have a serious chemical burn, the inside of my nose blistered, and I have some upper airway burns as well. Had to have a bronch to check for lower airway involvement...alas I had escaped.

Comical...maybe somewhat, but I really did get hurt. Per my 9 year old "I guess you won't be doing that again dad, huh?"

 

[Marc Cannon]

Well, I am glad to have found this forum. I've been using a bleach and water mixture for years to mop my kitchen floor. I have two dogs. One of them is older, and he waits to go outside to urinate. But my little girl, who is less than two, can't hold it as long as he can, and if I can't home to take them out at lunch, she'll pee on the papers I keep laid out in the kitchen. She's a good shot, but sometimes urine bleeds over onto the floor. I regularly mop my kitchen floor and tend to use Armstrong cleaner, but periodically (if I'm out of a floor cleanser), I'll simply use bleach and hot water. Then I remop with hot water only. I've never had any problems, but I'll play it safe in the future. Once, a while back, before I knew about the ammonia-bleach issue, I mopped my kitchen and bathroom floors with a mixture of water, bleach and ammonia. I was talking to my mother later that day and told her I'd been cleaning the house and mopping all the floors. She asked me what I used, and I told her. She immediately warned me of the dangers and told me to never use that combination ever again. She was shocked I didn't know that was such a dangerous combination. I guess I was very lucky with that, too, because that also caused zero problems. But I didn't think about the urine-ammonia connection. Thanks so much for the helpful information everyone provides. I'll be smarter and safer about cleaning in the future.

 

[peterdorey]

Urine & Bleach

Only learned of possibilities of this today ... but really, is the tiny amount of ammonia in fresh human (fem) urine wee'd into a toilet bowl with a previous capful of (4.6g/100g conc.) NaClO poured ½hour beforehand going to release much toxicity? I Left the window open beforehand √
Has anyone done tests?

 

[ScienceGuy234]

Also what would the result of mixing ammonia and bleach? Hmmmm...?
I know it doesn't smell good, but do they even react?

Thanx for looking

Jim[/QUOTE]

Seiriously? It makes chlorine gas which was used as a weapon in world war 1 (I recommend you don't breathe it)

 

[msredginger]

I just was poisoned by the gas produced by putting bleach on dog urine on my basement floor. By the time I got it up after it began frothing I could not breath and was vomiting.

 

[Borek]

Go see the doc immediately then.

 

[NascentOxygen]

I think I've read that pets are attracted to the smell of areas that you've cleaned with bleach, and like to pee there.

But check with pet forums (not physics forums) for the last word on cleaning up after pets.

 

[epenguin]

The concentration of urea in cat urine was asked. It is a generalisation that urea is more concentrated in most terrestrial mammals than in humans. It would take some time to assemble data. See attached table ref http://www.open.edu/openlearn/natur...es-the-desert-environment/content-section-3.2 However the figure quoted there for humans is quite a lot larger than I have seem elsewhere and I think it can be a fraction of molar. Cat I have seen can attain 5M. This relatively poor water economy in humans has long been one element in the speculation that our ancestors passed at least a period of time somewhere where fresh water availability was not a limiting problem for them, for which I think there is more recent evidence. We are not in such conditions now in most places!