Europium chloride is a yellow solid. When its temperature is lower than (including) its boiling point, some europium chloride, EuCl2, will be decomposed. It has strong water absorption, so when it is exposed to humid air, it will rapidly change from anhydrous europium chloride (EuCl3) to white crystalline hexahydrate, which is europium chloride hexahydrate (EuCl3·6H2O).

Preparation and use:

Simply heating europium chloride hydrate may cause a small part of product hydrolysis. The anhydrous europium chloride can be prepared by the following process: mixing europium chloride hexahydrate with some thionyl chloride (SOCl2, O=SCl2) and heating for about 15 hours. Europium chloride can be prepared from europium chloride by the following process: reducing it with water vapor in a gold container, and slowly heating it to 700ºC. Anhydrous europium chloride can be used to prepare organometallic compounds of europium, such as bis (pentamethylene chloride) europium (ii) and other complex compounds Europium chloride can be used to prepare other europium salts.