Highly selective and efficient determination of US Environmental Protection Agency priority phenols employing solid-phase extraction and non-aqueous capillary electrophoresis

Non-aqueous capillary electrophoresis has been used in the separation of a complete list of 26 priority phenols included in the 8041 US Environmental Protection Agency method and the 76/464/EEC European Union directive. A hig hly selective and efficient separation was obtained when the background ele ctrolyte used was 150 mM ammonium acetate dissolved in N-methylformamide-ac etonitrile (75:25). Solid-phase extraction was successfully assayed as an e nrichment strategy for the analysis of low-concentration samples. A styrene -divinylbenzene functionalized cartridge provided excellent recoveries of p henols from water samples at neutral pH. The limits of quantification obtai ned permit the application of the proposed method to the determination of p riority phenols in wastewater samples. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All r ights reserved.