Performance assessment of a passive sampler in industrial atmospheres

In this work we investigate the performances of a passive sampler (GABIE ba dge) in industrial atmospheres, in accordance with the general specificatio ns of the EN 838 standard. The field experiment was carried out in a paint- manufacturing factory producing a large number of pollutants at the workpla ces. A comparison was performed between the results obtained by passive sam pling and the conventional tube/pump method (reference method) on nine solv ents usually encountered in the different workshops: n-butanol, isobutanol, toluene, ethylbenzene, m-xylene, methylisobutylketone, methylethylketone ( MEK), ethyl acetate, butyl acetate. Results were compared by use of the dis tribution of the relative difference between badge "passive sampling" and t ube "active sampling" results (with the latter considered as the reference method). In general, results revealed good agreement between passive and ac tive sampling (except in the case of MEK) and confirmed the accuracy of sam pling rates determined for the GABIE sampler. Bias was generally low and va riability could be considered to be satisfactory (generally <20% with a max imum of 30% for ethylbenzene). For MEK, strong bias was noted together with probable underestimation of the tube results. Additional results lead us t o suggest that this phenomenon could be due to poor desorption of the SKC t ubes by carbon disulphide (CS2); (quantitative recovery for MEK is in fact possible using other desorption solvents).