Currently, quantitative determination of hazardous metals in plastic materials is an important problem for the quality control and for monitoring. In the European Union (EU), a RoHS (Restrictions on Hazardous Substance) directive, 1 which has limited the use of hazardous materials in almost all electric and electronic industrial materials, has been enforced. Especially, it has caused the serious problem on the plastic industry and materials because of being applied to the plastics in the electrical and electronic equipment.Certified Reference Materials (CRMs) are essential tools in order to confirm the accuracy and precision of used analytical procedure and analytical results. At present, several plastic CRMs containing trace metals have been available, such as VDA 001 -004, 2 and BCR 680 and 681. [3][4][5][6] In Japan, many kinds of CRMs and inhouse reference materials were produced since 2000. 8 JSAC 0611 to 0615 were one set of five CRMs with Pb, Cd and Cr for XRF (X-ray fluorescence spectrometry) analysis. 9In the JSAC, the new plastic CRMs (named as JSAC 0621 to 0625) containing mercury for use in XRF analysis were developed and certified. This paper deals with: (i) preparation of CRMs, (ii) durability of the x-ray irradiation, (iii) homogeneity test, and (iv) the certification of reference materials. Plastic Resin and ChemicalsThe CRMs of the plastics were prepared from commercially available polyester resin (Clear polyester, Epoch Co., Japan). Mercury chemical was used for the organometallic compound [mercury cyclohexylbutylate (ACROS)]. Toluene (Junsei, JIS guaranteed grade reagent) was used to make solutions of the organometallic compound. The Japan Society for Analytical Chemistry has developed some new plastic certified reference materials (CRMs) for the analysis of mercury in polyester disks using XRF analysis. These CRMs (named as JSAC 0621 -0625) were prepared by casting polyesters including a toluene solution of organometallic compounds as a standard. Concentrations of the five levels of mercury ranged from 0 to 250 mg/kg. Homogeneity tests of prepared disks had shown excellent results. Interlaboratory comparison study for the certification was performed by 15 laboratory participants. The z-scores in robust statistical method was applied for the evaluation of outliers. The certified values were assigned after discarding outliers. The uncertainties of certified values were determined as the confidence levels of 95%.

A cw-a-switched Nd-YAG Iaser was used in a laser ablation (LA) system for rapid analysis of steel using inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometry (lCP-AES) and inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (lCP-MS). The problems accompanyingwith the laser ablation (LA) such as the quantity of fine particles produced by LA for different steel samp[es were resolved by adjusting the laser radiation conditions. Also the contamination from impurities in the argon gas used to produce the The precision in relative standard deviation (RSD, olo) under each of the conditions tested ranged from I Carrier gas flow rates were 0.5 !min~I (O) and 1.0!min~1 (O).

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, 21 0-0855 Japan Along with production control in steel making, the maintaining and improving quality has strongly required the development of a rapid and accurate method for the analysis of steel sample. A cw-Qswitched Nd-YAG Iaser was used in a laser ablation (LA) system for rapid analysis of steel using inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometry (lCP-AES) and inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (lCP-MS). The problems accompanying with the LA such as the quantity of f]ne particles produced by adjusting the laser radiation conditions. Also the contamination from impurity in the argon gas used to produced the ICP was reduced by zirconium purifier. A rapid method with high accuracy was established for steel analysis.

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