Comparison of three digestion methods for the determination of the aqua regia soluble content of lead,cadmium and chromium in sewage sludges by ETAAS

A procedure for the determination of the aqua regia soluble content of lead, cadmium and chromium in a sewage sludge reference material (CRM 145R) by electrothermal atomic absorption spectrometry (ETAAS) is described. A comparison of the dissolution procedure proposed in the certification report, to an oven-assisted digestion and a proposed microwave digestion procedure is performed. In the ETAAS method developed, 1 g of Pt proved to be an appropriate modifier for each of the above heavy metals. Possible sources of error at each analytical step are addressed. The metal contents obtained with the proposed method are in a good agreement at 95% significance level with the certified values given for CRM 145R.