Characterization of volatile and semivolatile compounds in waste landfill leachates using stir bar sorptive extraction-GC/MS.

Stir bar sorptive extraction in combination with thermal desorption coupled online to capillary gas chromatography-mass spectrometry was applied to investigate volatile and semivolatile fractions in two waste leachate samples: old and fresh ones. The present study helps to improve our knowledge of waste leachate organic composition. The aim is to then make use of this knowledge afterwards in order to generate more reliable and specific treatment processes for waste leachates and thus to respect the environmental statute law regarding their rejection. The volatile and semivolatile compounds appeared to be mainly anthropogenic in origin. Moreover, lactic acid and cyclic octaatomic sulfur could potentially be used as microbiological activity indicators, since they occur during organic matter degradation processes within waste leachates.