A simple and rapid method for the determination of mercury in gas condensates by inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry

Abstract

A method for the accurate determination of mercury content in gas condensates is of significance in the applications of condensates. In this paper, a simple and rapid method for the determination of mercury in gas condensates using inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry was established. The effects of experimental conditions including extraction reagent, sample mass, extraction time in water bath, and membrane filtration treatment were investigated. A sample mass of 1.00 g, 10 mL of aqua regia as pretreatment reagent, and boiling water bath time of 60 min were selected as the optimal pretreatment conditions. After hydrophilic membrane filtering, the obtained solution was diluted 10 times using 3% (v/v) nitric acid and the inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry determination was conducted. The method detection limit was 0.4 ng g⁻¹, and the relative standard deviation range was from 2.8% to 5.4% for the samples of different natures. Both standard addition recovery experiments and comparison results with a microwave-assisted digestion method indicated that the proposed method was reliable for the determination of mercury in gas condensates.