The analysis of mercury and its species for environmental applications

This work has made significant contributions in the field of analytical/environmental chemistry of mercury. The fundamentals of an instrumental system based on thermal decomposition, amalgamation, and atomic absorption spectrometry have been explored in detail. An Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) method, EPA Method 7473, has been developed and validated based on this instrumental system (1–3). Method 7473 has been rigorously tested in field environments in conjunction with mercury remediation of soil at natural gas utility sites (4, 5), and is one of the first EPA methods officially recognized for the quantitative field and laboratory analysis of mercury.; Two complementary speciation techniques have been investigated during this study. The research provides some of the framework for the Speciated Isotope Dilution Mass Spectrometry (SIDMS) analysis of mercury species, which is a definite technique for mercury speciation. Additional speciation techniques have been tested in conjunction with the development of draft EPA Method 3200 for the selective extraction of operationally-defined mercury species (6, 7).; The coal-powered electric utility, which has been determined to be the largest source of man-made mercury emissions, has also benefited from this research. Analytical results for mercury in coal and coal by-products have been significantly improved. In addition, a method for estimating yearly mercury emissions and the associated uncertainty based on mass balance calculations has been developed and applied to real-world data (8).; Several aspects of analytical chemistry of mercury have been investigated throughout the course of this research. A rapid and portable method for the analysis of total mercury has been validated. Mercury speciation techniques have been refined, and the analysis of coal by-products has been used to predict mercury emissions. The fundamentals associated with these methodologies have been worked out, and these techniques have been used to help tackle realworld environmental problems. This dissertation provides solutions to some difficulties associated with the analysis of mercury. In many cases, however, this dissertation only opens the door to more research.