OK. So here's the situation. You're sitting on the town council for a small country town. Unfortunately, you have the bad luck of sitting on the council of a town full of uncultured heathens who can't appreciate the beauty and sophisication that a device deigned to convert one big mass of water into thousands of little, tiny, easily evaporated drops of water in a country still reeling from the worst drought in recorded history and a gradual, long term downfall in rainfall that has interrupted a long, previously predictable sequence of minor drought years between loner periods of relative wetness lends to the main street of your town. So you were rather irritated when someone came along and unceremoniously dumped an entire box of washing powder into your nice new fountain the day after it first went on.
So, not to be outwitted by the afore mentioned heathens, you apparently added some mysterious chemical concoction which apparently prevents bubbles from forming in said fountains water. So, my question to you, as chemistry boffins is - does this chemical actually exist (ie. are they just trying to make people think firther sabotague futile), what is it likely to be, and should I waste money dumping another box of washing powder into the fountain without some sort of counter for the anti foaming agent?
I've been trying to figure out what it might be, but to no avail. All I can think of is that they've hardened the water, which would be the simplest thing to do, and pretty much at the level of thought of your average town councillor, but at the same time easily avoidable by just using dishwashing liquid. However, if there is some easily obtainable anti foaming agent that they might also have used, I'd be very interested to hear of it, and any counters I might consider employing.
