Global Interlaboratory Assessments of Perfluoroalkyl Substances under the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants

Publication date: Available online 10 April 2019Source: TrAC Trends in Analytical ChemistryAuthor(s): H. Fiedler, I. van der Veen, J. de BoerSummaryThe Global Monitoring Plan (GMP) according to article 16 of the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) requires that POP laboratories must be capable – at any time – to analyse samples for POPs within a variation of ±25%. Based on this target error of 25%, a statistical model using z-scores was applied to assess the performance of analytical laboratories for POPs and a number of matrices. Since the second round of these ‘Bi-ennial Global Interlaboratory Assessment on Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs)’, carried out in 2012/2013, perfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs) have been included into the proficiency tests. The third round was carried out in 2016/2017. The test materials included test solutions of PFASs analytical standards, the abiotic matrices sediment, air (extract) and water and the biotic matrices fish, human milk and human plasma. The number of laboratories submitting results for PFASs remained quite stable (IL2=27 laboratories; IL3=29), but there was broader geographic distribution observed in IL3: in addition to the laboratories from Asia and the Western Europe/other groups, two laboratories from Africa participated, two from Central-Eastern Europe and one from the Latin American/Caribbean region.Considering that PFASs were introduced for the first time in round 2, the results were good to...
Source: TrAC Trends in Analytical Chemistry - Category: Chemistry Source Type: research