Comparison of Four Methods for Digestion of Sewage Sludge Samples for Analysis of Metals by Atomic Absorption Spectrophotometry

Abstract
Four digestion methods were examined for the determination of cobalt, nickel, chromium, cadmium, lead, copper, zinc, manganese, iron, potassium, sodium, calcium, and magnesium in sewage sludge samples by atomic absorption spectrophotometry. The four methods examined were: (1) dry ashing followed by digestion with aqua regia, (2) digestion with aqua regia, (3) digestion with nitric acid, and (4) digestion with nitric acid followed by treatment of the residual by sulfuric acid and dry ashing. Based on results concerning observed metal concentrations, precision, recovery of digested standard solutions, recovery of metal standards added to sludge samples, time consumption and laboratory safety, digestion of sewage sludge with nitric acid is considered to be the best method for routine measurements of metals by atomic absorption spectrophotometry.