Common Operations and Wet Chemical Methods in Environmental Laboratories - Fundamentals of Environmental Sampling and Analysis - page 127

Chapter 6

Common Operations and Wet
Chemical Methods in
Environmental Laboratories

6.1 BASIC OPERATIONS IN ENVIRONMENTAL LABORATORIES
6.2 WET CHEMICAL METHODS AND COMMON TECHNIQUES IN
ENVIRONMENTAL ANALYSIS

6.3 ANALYTICAL PRINCIPLES FOR COMMON WET CHEMICAL METHODS

REFERENCES

QUESTIONS AND PROBLEMS

This chapter signifies a shift of course content from field sampling to the laboratory
analysis. It also introduces some of the basic laboratory techniques required to
perform advanced instrumentation to be introduced in Chapters 8 to 12. The purposes
of this chapter are (i) to introduce some of the essential operations in environmen-
tal laboratories performing wet chemical analysis along with safety and waste
disposal activities, and (ii) to help understand the chemical principles involved in
the measurement of common environmental parameters using wet chemical
methods.
The importance of wet chemical methods is self-explanatory. The gravimetric
or volumetric based wet chemical method (i.e., the classical method as defined in
Chapter 1) does not require expensive equipment and therefore can be routinely
employed in many environmental laboratories. The wet chemical methods are not
inferior but are equally important to instrumental analysis. For some monitoring
parameters, they are absolutely necessary for sample preparation prior to

instrumental analysis. Even with sophisticated instrumental analysis, the data