Soil pollution occurs when heavy metals, organic solvents, or other hazardous substances are leaked from factories that use those substances or inappropriately buried, for example. Shimadzu contributes to the protection of soil environments by developing and supplying relevant analytical and measuring instruments.
There is concern that some components in agricultural pesticides tend to remain in the soil, which results in substances remaining in the ecosystem and food chain. Multiple residual pesticides can be analyzed simultaneously using a gas chromatograph mass spectrometer or a liquid chromatograph mass spectrometer.
In an effort to prevent soil pollution, criteria values have been specified so that concentrations of hazardous metals in soil remain below certain levels. An ICP atomic emission spectrometer is typically used to analyze hazardous metals in soil, because it can analyze trace quantities of hazardous metals efficiently.
Both ICP atomic emission spectrometers and atomic absorption spectrophotometers (AA) are typical instruments used for elemental analysis.
When the number of metal elements to be measured is small, AA is more suitable because it is easier in the procedure.