A simplified distillation-based sulfur speciation method for sulfidic soil materials

Abstract

Speciation of inorganic sulfur species, mainly pyrite and metastable iron sulfides by operationally defined methods, is widely used for risk assessment of acid sulfate soils by quantifying the acidity producing elements, as well as for general characterisation of marine sediments and subaqueous soils. “Traditional” sulfur speciation methods commonly use highly specialised glassware which can be cumbersome for the operator, or, require long reaction times which limit the usability of the method. We present a simplified method which has a sufficiently low limit of detection (0.002%) and quantitation (0.006%) required for the analysis of sulfidic sulfur in acid sulfate soil materials. Commercially available sulfide reagents were used for determining reproducibility and the method was assessed on natural sulfidic soil materials, including fine to coarse grained soil materials as well as sulfide bearing peat, with a large variation of metastable sulfide and pyrite content.

Applying Industrial Side Streams in the Neutralization of Acid Generating Sulfide-Rich Sediments – the Impact on Ph and Leaching of Harmful Elements

“…The total sulfide (total reduced sulfur, TRS) content of the samples was determined with a simplified distillation method for sulfur speciation (Dalhem et al, 2021). The dredged spoil samples were placed in an airtight bag and frozen to prevent oxidation.…”