SOURCE IDENTIFICATION OF AN UNKNOWN SPILL (2002)FROM QUEBEC BY THE MULTI-CRITERIONANALYTICAL APPROACH AND LAB SIMULATIONOF THE SPILL SAMPLE

摘要

This paper describes a case study of an oil spill into Canal Ste-rnAnne-de-Bellevue, Quebec in 2002. In response to this specific oilrnidentification need, a lab spill simulation was designed to obtainrnsimulated spill samples from the suspected source samples. The integratedrnmulti-criterion approach using GC/MS and GC/FID wasrnthen applied for fingerprinting and identifying the spill oil samples.rnThe distribution patterns of hydrocarbons in the spill andrnsuspected source samples were recognized and compared. Analysisrnof oil-characteristic biomarkers and the extended suite of parentrnand alkylated polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) werernperformed. A variety of diagnostic ratios of “source-specificrnmarker” compounds for interpreting chemical fingerprinting datarnwere determined and analyzed. Finally, the major components inrnsuspected source samples were identified. The detailed chemicalrncharacterization data highlight that: (1) the spilled oil 264 isrndiesel fuel, while the suspected source sample 265 is an emulsifiedrnBunker C type fuel; (2) another suspected source sample 266 is arndegreaser-type “pine oil” product; (3) the synthetic spill samplernfrom 265 and 266 has a completely different GC profile and chemicalrncomposition from the spill sample 264. No component of sam-rnsamplern266 was found and recognized in sample 264.