Solid-Sampling Electrothermal Vaporization Inductively Coupled Plasma Optical Emission Spectrometry for Direct Determination of Total Oxygen in Coal

A new analytical method for direct determination of total oxygen contents in eight coal samples of the Argonne Premium Coal (APC) series and in the NIST SRM 1632d is presented. The development of a suitable calibration procedure, optimization of measurement conditions, and the application of a tailored data processing for handling of plasma effects and high blanks enable the quantification of oxygen simultaneously with other trace, minor, or major elements in whole coal samples by means of electrothermal vaporization inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry (ETV-ICP OES). For comparison, the oxygen contents were determined by a direct oxygen analyzer. The obtained oxygen values of the APC and the reference material NIST SRIVI 1632d were compared to data in the literature. The precision of the ETV-ICP OES was within +/-3.5%, and the recovery better than 92%. With this good accuracy, the developed direct solid sampling method ETV-ICP OES is well suited for the fast determination of oxygen in coals, varying in rank from lignite to semianthracite, in a content range of about 100 ppm up to 27% using 1.5 mg sample weight. This direct analysis method represents an accurate, advantageous alternative to currently used methods for estimation of total oxygen contents in coals.