The paper presents procedures for the determination of a wide range of elements in polyethylene terephthalate (PET), polypropylene (PP), and expanded polystyrene (EPS). It proposes dissolution of PET, PP, and EPS in a mixture of H2SO4 and HNO3 upon heating in open quartz vessels. The resulting solutions are analyzed by inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometry (ICP AES) and inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP MS). Optimal (compromise) concentrations of matrix component in the analyzed solutions are determined: 1100 and 700 mg/L for ICP AES and ICP MS, respectively. Y and Be are used as internal standards for ICP AES analyses. For the ICP MS analysis, an internal standard (Rh) is required to determine B, Bi, Ni, and Sc. The developed procedures enable the determination of 55 elements by ICP AES with limits of detection (LODs) ranging from 0.06 to 70 µg/g, and 48 elements by ICP MS with LODs ranging from 0.001 to 10 µg/g. The validity of the developed procedures is confirmed using the spike experiments. Using the developed procedures, concentrations of a total of 32 elements are determined in previously used commercial products; concentrations of the remaining elements are below the LODs of the procedures.
Guselnikova et al. (Sun,) studied this question.