Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) used at home is colourless and odourless. Its leakage can cause serious explosion or fire hazard. To detect the leakage, the manufacturing companies mix some suitable compound in the LPG which has a very strong, highly obnoxious odour that can be detected as low as 1 part in a billion parts of air when a leakage occurs. After reading the above paragraph, answer the following questions: (a) Which compound is generally mixed in the LPG to detect the leakage? (b) What steps should be taken if the leakage is detected?

Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) used at home is colourless and odourless

1.	Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) used at home is colourless and odourless. Its leakage can cause serious explosion or fire hazard. To detect the leakage, the manufacturing companies mix some suitable compound in the LPG which has a very strong, highly obnoxious odour that can be detected as low as 1 part in a billion parts of air when a leakage occurs. After reading the above paragraph, answer the following questions: (a) Which compound is generally mixed in the LPG to detect the leakage? (b) What steps should be taken if the leakage is detected?
Answer» compound named “Ethyl Mercaptan” contains sulphur and hence it does produce a very foul odour like that of rotten cabbages. This compound gets added in the LPG in smalll quantities when the LPG gets out of the cylinder through the MAIN storage terminals. The smell that follows because the LPG coming out makes us detect a leakage. (b) There are two important steps to be taken when the leakage of LPG is detected (i) Open all the windows and the doors at the house – This is done to let air from the atmosphere circulate in the house making the LPG gas move out of the house along with air. Hence there would be no harmful effects. (ii) Stop operating any electrical SWITCHES – This is done because when a switch is pressed , a SLIGHT FIRE SPARK pops up. This spark would be more than enough d to burst a house that is having LPG gas mixed with the air inside the house. "