Analysis of selenium in oil refinery wastewater by hydride generation atomic absorption spectrometry

This study was conducted to find out the analysis condition of selenium(Se) in oil refinery wastewater with a high concentration of Se using the atomic absorption spectrometry with hydride generation system (HG-AAS). From various experiments that reduced Se(VI) to Se(IV), the optimum pretreatment condition was determined to be a sample volume of 10 mL, HCl 10 mL, with a 30 min heating time in a water bath. In oil refinery wastewater, as the concentration of organics and constitution became higher, the recovery rates of Se decreased. Therefore, three acid digestion methods ( digestion, digestion, and microwave acid digestion) were tested on the recovery rates of Se in reference to the digestion of organics, petroleum and oxidation from organic Se(org.), Se(IV) to Se(VI). The experiment results showed that the average recovery rate of Se was the highest in microwave acid digestion, although all of the digestions were more than 90%. In consequence, the pretreatment procedure of microwave digestion followed by HCl addition was the most suitable for selenium analysis in oil refinery wastewater by using HG-AAS.