text: why does adding salts to water increases the abilty to conduct electricity?   when salt nacl dissolves in water h2o what happens is that the na dissasociates from the cl and we get na+ surrounded by oh- ions, and h+ surounded by cl- ions.   so essentially we have a lot of ions that are free to move, and where there are free ions there are free electron, and where there are free electrons there is high conductivity.