Abstract
For the determination of organic pollutants in water, measurements of COD, BOD, TOC and ultra violet absorption are commonly used. In the present investigation, measurement of fluorescence intensity was proposed instead of TOC value for the determination of organic pollutants in coastal sea water. Maximum wavelengths of excitation and fluorescence spectra were (330350) nm and (440460) nm for 15 sea water samples, respectively. A good correlation was observed between TOC value and fluorescence intensity. The correlation coefficient between these two values was 0.99 for 15 sea water. Fluorescence intensity of aqueous and artificial sea water solutions of several kinds of organic substances were measured. The mean fluorescence intensity corresponding to 1ppm of TOC for the 15 sea water was 1.06. Similar value of the intensity was obtained by lignin sulfonate solution. Lower concentration of the pollutants is detected by using a stronger excitation light source. The method can also be applied to river water with satisfactory results. The proposed method is assumed to be used for an automatic measurement of the organic pollutants in various natural water.
