Comparison of two methods of measuring wood pyrolysis tar

Two methods for the sampling and analysis of tar produced from wood pyrolysis were compared. The first method used a conventional cold-trapping technique in solvent-filled impingers followed by liquid injection. The second one is a new application of multibed solid-phase adsorbent (SPA) tubes followed by thermal desorption (TD). Both methods are based on gas chromatography (GC) coupled with mass spectrometry (MS). Quantification was performed with a well reproducible GC-MS method with three internal deuterated standards. The SPA/TD method offers several advantages. No solvent is required, the detection levels are improved, and gas chromatography separation is easier. Moreover, sampling time is reduced from about 1h (for the conventional cold-trapping technique in impingers) to a few seconds. No discrimination was observed between the two sampling methods for the 10 quantified compounds (aromatic compounds from benzene to phenanthrene and phenols) except for benzene.