Utilizing 100 mL sample volumes for EPA Method 608.3 automated extractions on the Biotage Horizon 5000

Pesticides, including insecticides, fungicides, and herbicides, are used extensively to increase agricultural yield. However, these pesticides can be detrimental to the health of humans as well as animals. It is important to monitor organochlorine pesticides and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) not just in drinking water (US EPA Method 508), but also in wastewater (US EPA Method 608.3). Some influent wastewater samples can be heavily laden with particulates, sludge, and the like, so it may be difficult to extract an entire liter of this sample when following US EPA Method 608.3. Fortunately, with this method, laboratories have the option of extracting smaller sample volumes, thus reducing the particulates that needs to be filtered out of the sample during extraction. In this application note, Biotage provides a solution for extracting 100 mL of 608.3 wastewater samples utilizing the Biotage^® Horizon 5000 to automatically load the sample and rinse the original sample container for solid phase extraction (SPE), DryDisk^® Solvent Drying System for drying the residual water from the extracts, and the TurboVap^® for concentrating the dried extracts. Samples are extracted in methylene chloride, then solvent exchanged into hexane prior to analysis by gas chromatography/electron capture detection (GC/ECD).