Determination of Chlorophenols in Wastewater with Methyl Chloroformate Derivatization, Solid Phase Extraction, and Gas Chromatography–Mass Spectrometry

Abstract

The determination of chlorophenols in wastewater with methyl chloroformate derivatization, solid phase extraction, and gas chromatography–mass spectrometry is reported. In order to employ this combined solid phase derivative extraction method, quantitative extraction was performed by the introduction of 100 mL of sample in 1.0 mol L−1 sodium hydroxide into a column containing 500 mg of packed resin at a flow rate of 1.0 mL/min. The chlorophenols were retained and derivatized quantitatively in the column by the introduction of 0.25 mL of methyl chloroformate. The derivatized analytes were eluted with 5.0 mL of hexane before the effluent was dried under a stream of nitrogen. The dried solution was diluted to a volume of 50 µL with hexane followed by analysis by gas chromatography–mass spectrometry. The preconcentration parameters were optimized and under these conditions: limits of detection from 0.010 to 0.423 µg L−1, a preconcentration factor of 2500, and precision values from 4.8 to 7.7% as the relative standard deviation were obtained. The method was employed for the analysis of water samples and the recoveries of the analytes were between 76 and 103%.