Simultaneous determination of phosphate esters and phthalate esters in clean room air and indoor air by gas chromatography–mass spectrometry Original Research Article

A gas chromatograph–mass spectrometry (GC–MS) method has been developed for the simultaneous determination of phosphate and phthalate esters in clean room and indoor air. Dibutyl phthalate (DBP), diethylhexyl phthalate (DEHP), trimethyl phosphate (TMP) and seven other phosphate esters present in air were collected using a Waters Sep-Pak PS Air cartridge and extracted with acetone. A quantity of 4 μl of each extract was analyzed by GC–MS. Quantification limits for 2.88 m3 of air sample were 2–20 ng m−3 for phosphate esters and 100 ng m−3 for phthalate esters. These values corresponded to 10 times the standard deviation of the peak areas. The breakthrough amounts of determinants in the Sep-Pak PS Air cartridge were 100 μg for trimethyl phosphate (TMP) and ≥2600 μg for the other nine components. Analytical results for air samples collected from three office rooms ranged from 100 to 320 ng m−3 for tributyl phosphate and 350 to 780 ng m−3 for dibutyl phthalate. However, the concentration of the determinants in four newly built clean rooms were under the minimum limits for determination of phosphate and phthalate esters in air.