ABSTRACT
Petroleum is a naturally occurring liquid with widely different composition and complexity. Except for a few surface seepages, the vast portion of petroleum is located well below the surface of the earth and it is extracted only by drilling. Protecting the ecological system and water resources from petroleum contamination are of main concern. EPA method-418.1, known as total petroleum hydrocarbon concentrations (TPH)-Infrared Spectrophotometer (IR) is based upon a methodology developed to determine the oil and grease content of industrial wastewaters, sewage, and sludges. The TPH-IR method extracts “oil and grease” from a sample with l,l,2-trichloro-l,2,2-trifluoroethane. This chapter aims to compare the TPH-IR and gas chromatograph (GC)-flame ionization detector (FID) applications for the quantitation of total petroleum hydrocarbons in different types of oil samples. It provide a comparison between the data obtained from TPH-IR, and GC-FID-TPH for widely used petroleum based oils.
