Total petroleum hydrocarbon monitoring in biodegradation of weathered crude oily residues

摘要

The work presented in this paper provides evidences that the applied techniques for monitoring toal hydrocarbon concentration on weatheed crude oily residues using different analytical methods may influence markedly the interpreation of the biodegradation process. In this study we show the results of an extensive field bioremediation study (over three years) involving different hydrocarbon types that were applied to field plots in different location with different soil condition in the province of Mendoza, on the west of Argentina. Experiments were conduct under local weather and precipitation conditions. A higher extend of total hydrocarbon was measured when successive xtraction with chloroform, hexane and ethanol followed by calcination of residual organic matter was used, in comparison with norms ASTM D-473 and USEPA 418.1.