Materials and products used indoors or in vehicle cabins need to be evaluated for possible release of toxic and / or odorous volatile and semi-volatile organic chemicals (VOCs and SVOCs) to ensure the safety and comfort of occupants. Similar issues affect the electronics business – with materials emissions, particularly of semi-volatiles, causing quality issues during clean room fabrication and assembly of PC/electronics components.

Regulations such as the EU Construction Products Directive and new health-based evaluation protocols (for example; the AgBB procedure for flooring (Germany) and the Californian ‘CHPS’ program for school building / furnishing projects) are putting additional pressure on construction product manufacturers to test emissions as part of routine QA/QC. Similar tests are being promoted by leading car manufacturers and may be required on all consumer products once new chemicals legislation (REACH) is introduced across Europe.

The chemicals of interest cover a wide volatility range and many compound types (hydrocarbons, acids, glycol ethers, halocarbons, phthalates, alcohols, aldehydes, esters, ethers, ketones, amines, monoterpenes, nitrogenated compounds, sulphates, etc.) They are present in materials at levels from low ppb to high percent.

Leading-edge technology for materials emissions / content testing
Markes provides innovative technology for simple / reliable materials emissions testing. Key products include:

1. New Micro-Chamber / Thermal Extractor (µ-CTE) for rapid, automatic testing of bulk or surface emissions as part of routine QA/QC <<STOP PRESS:  New publication detailing correlation between µ-CTE and conventional emission test methods>>
   
   
2. FLEC® emission cell – A simple-to-use, method compliant alternative to conventional emissions chambers
   
   
3. Manual and automated systems for direct thermal desorption / extraction (TD) of volatiles and fogging compounds from construction materials and car trim components.
   
   
4. Method compliant TD – combines with GC(-MS) for simultaneous and quantitative analysis of volatile and semi-volatile compounds collected on sorbent tubes
   
   
5. Enhanced software and database tools for improved detection of target compounds in complex chromatographic backgrounds

Markes TD systems can be connected to any make of GC(MS) including systems from Agilent Technologies, Perkin Elmer, Shimadzu, Thermo Electron and Varian.

Available free of charge to all TD users:
Thermal Desorption: A Practical Applications Guide. II Residual Volatiles & Materials Emissions Testing. Click here for further information