Determination of total fluorine in five coal reference materials by proton-induced gamma-ray emission spectrometry

Abstract

The direct non-destructive proton-induced gamma-ray emission (PIGE) technique with a germanium detector was applied to the determination of total fluorine concentration in five coal reference materials (BCR 40, NIST 1632b, NIST 1635, SARM 20 and USGS CLB-1). Duplicate analyses were made from five randomly selected bottles of each coal. Individual data are presented and some problems (calibration, proton stopping power, effects of sample heating by the proton beam, background estimation) which were encountered during this study are discussed. Sensitivity and reproducibility of the determinations, and homogeneity of the coal samples with respect to fluorine contents by analysis of variance were investigated. The present data are also compared with the few published values for these reference samples, including other PIGE data. The use of synthetic standards and spiked samples in the present study suggested that the PIGE method was more accurate than other techniques.