Continuous monitoring of polychlorinated biphenyls in air using direct sampling APCI/ITMS

We report a continuous monitoring system of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) in air, which uses direct sampling atmospheric pressure chemical ionization (APCI)/ion trap mass spectrometry (ITMS). In APCI, humidity in the atmosphere, which fluctuates from 0 to 10 vol.%, influences PCB sensitivity. In dry air (0.5% humidity), the detection limits of Di- to Hp-chlorinated biphenyls (CB) are 0.01-0.44 μg/Nm3 (μg/m3 at normal condition) with time resolution of 1 min, whereas the sensitivity decreases to less than 1/10 when water vapor concentration is 10 vol.%. The sensitivity decrease is calibrated in real-time using an internal standard, trichlorophenol. In order to obtain the calibration accuracy of ±30%, we dilute the sample gas by dry air, decreasing the water vapor concentration below 1%. We applied the monitor to measure Di- to Hp-CB in ventilation air from a PCB decomposition plant. The monitored PCB concentration levels agreed well with that by high-resolution gas chromatography/high resolution mass spectrometry (HRGC/HRMS).