Violaine Ponsin and André Poirier

UQAM-Geotop

Many transformation pathways of chlorinated organic contaminants involve breaking of carbon-chlorine bonds, which makes Chlorine Compound-Specific Isotope Analysis (Cl-CSIA) a particularly promising approach to understand the degradation of such compounds in environmental conditions. 

Analytical methods for Cl-CSIA are so far only available for a narrow range of compounds. This limited availability is explained by numerous analytical challenges associated with Cl-CSIA. The most common approach is gas chromatography-single quadrupole mass spectrometer (GC-qMS). However, the applicability of this method is currently limited by the strong constrains on the type of standards required that makes it difficult to apply to new compounds. A promising alternative for Cl-CSIA is multi-collector inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (MC-ICP-MS). This talk will present the first results of the tests performed at Geotop and the challenges we are faced with.