Determination of Trace Amounts of Formaldehyde in Water Using High Performance Liquid Chromatography and Acetylacetone as a Derivative Reagent

Abstract

A simple analytical method to quantify formaldehyde in water at lower levels (µg/L) was developed using a high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and acetylacetone as a derivative reagent. Unlike conventional methods, no extraction and/or concentration were required. The derivative reagent was added into samples and reacted for 30 minutes at 80℃ prior to the analysis of formaldehyde using HPLC. The method detection limit and the limit of quantification for this method were 1.6 and 5.0 µg/L, respectively. This method also achieved high precision (0.6-3.0%) and accuracy (91.6-106.3%). The recovery rates for various environmental samples ranged from 92.0 to 115.2%.