Generation of CO2 gas mixtures by dynamic dilution for the development of gaseous certified reference materials

Abstract

The use of Certified Reference Materials (CRMs) is of utmost importance to achieve the comparability and traceability of data, which are essential features of measurement results in environmental and climate fields. The present paper focuses on the generation of gas mixtures at known composition of carbon dioxide at atmospheric amount-of-substance fraction in synthetic air by means of a dynamic dilution system, designed and implemented at the Istituto Nazionale di Ricerca Metrologica (INRiM). The validation of the dynamic system in terms of amount-of-substance fraction is presented. The system was also used to verify the carbon dioxide amount-of-substance fraction of a suite of gas mixtures gravimetrically prepared at INRiM in the framework of the EMPIR Joint Research Project 19ENV05 – STELLAR. Dynamic dilution proved to be an effective tool for the preparation and certification of CRMs for gaseous pollutants (i.e. carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxides) relevant for monitoring environmental pollution and climate changes.