Form Approved
REPORT DOCUMENTATION PAGE
OMB No. 0704-0188
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1. AGENCY USE ONLY (Leave blank)
2. REPORT DATE
3. REPORT TYPE AND DATES COVERED
August 1999
4. TITLE AND SUBTITLE
5. FUNDING NUMBERS
Determination of Nitroaromatic, Nitramine, and Nitrate Ester
Explosives in Soils Using GC-ECD
6. AUTHORS
Marianne E. Walsh and Thomas A. Ranney
7. PERFORMING ORGANIZATION NAME(S) AND ADDRESS(ES)
8. PERFORMING ORGANIZATION
REPORT NUMBER
Special Report 99-12
U.S. Army Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory
72 Lyme Road
Hanover, New Hampshire 03755
9. SPONSORING/MONITORING AGENCY NAME(S) AND ADDRESS(ES)
10. SPONSORING/MONITORING
AGENCY REPORT NUMBER
Office of the Chief of Engineers
U.S. Army Engineer Waterways Experiment Station
Washington, DC 20314-1000
Vicksburg, MS 39180
SFIM-AEC-ET-CR-99043
Defense Advanced Research
U.S. Army Environmental Center
Projects Agency
Aberdeen Proving Ground, MD 21010-5401
Arlington, VA 22203-1714
11. SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES
12a. DISTRIBUTION/AVAILABILITY STATEMENT
12b. DISTRIBUTION CODE
Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited.
Available from NTIS, Springfield, Virginia 22161
13. ABSTRACT (Maximum 200 words)
Nitroaromatic, nitramine, and nitrate ester explosives are analytes of interest for hazardous waste site character-
ization and land mine detection. Traditionally determined by high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC),
these thermally labile analytes may be determined by gas chromatography (GC) by using direct injection into a
deactivated liner and a short (6-m) wide-bore capillary column. Gas chromatography-electron capture detector
(GC-ECD) and HPLC-ultraviolet (UV) concentration estimates of these compounds in field-contaminated soils
from hazardous waste sites were compared, and excellent correlation (r > 0.97) was found between the two meth-
ods of analysis for the compounds most frequently detected: 2,4,6-trinitrotoluene (TNT), hexahydro-1,3,5-trinitro-
1,3,5-triazine (RDX), 2,4-dinitrotoluene (2,4-DNT), 1,3-dinitrobenzene (1,3-DNB), 1,3,5-trinitrobenzene (TNB), and
octahydro-1,3,5,7-tetranitro-1,3,5,7-tetrazocine (HMX). GC-ECD method detection limits (MDL) were about 1 g/
kg for the di- and trinitroaromatics, about 10 g/kg for the mononitroaromatics, 3 g/kg for RDX, 25 g/kg for
HMX, and between 10 and 40 g/kg for the nitrate esters (NG and PETN).
14. SUBJECT TERMS
15. NUMBER OF PAGES
Explosives
GC-ECD
48
Gas chromatography
TNT
16. PRICE CODE
17. SECURITY CLASSIFICATION
18. SECURITY CLASSIFICATION
19. SECURITY CLASSIFICATION
20. LIMITATION OF ABSTRACT
OF REPORT
OF THIS PAGE
OF ABSTRACT
UNCLASSIFIED
UNCLASSIFIED
UNCLASSIFIED
UL
Standard Form 298 (Rev. 2-89)
NSN 7540-01-280-5500
Prescribed by ANSI Std. Z39-18
298-102
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