According to mercury species with different solubilities, an analytical procedure involving sequential chemical extraction has been developed for partitioning of mercury species in sediments into five fractions:water-soluble Hg; HCl-soluble Hg; KOH-soluble Hg; nitric acid-soluble Hg and aqua regia-soluble Hg. The separated species are then analyzed by cold atomic fluorescent mercury analyzer.
In order to acquire adequate understanding of mercury speciation, experiments were conducted on replicate s...