Capillary electrophoretic determination of cyanide leaching solutions from automobile catalytic converters

A capillary electrophoresis (CE) method to determine metal-cyano complexes from leaching solutions of automobile catalytic converters has been developed. The separation and detection conditions have been optimized and analysis times up to 20 min and metal detection limits in the ppb range have been obtained. The CE analysis of leaching solutions from different converters allowed the determination of Fe(II)-, Cu(I)-, Ni(II)-, Pd(II)- and Pt(II)-cyano complexes and NO3-, On the other hand, adsorption onto activated carbon is used as a concentration process for precious metal-cyano complexes and as a process of pollutant removal. The adsorption kinetics of the compounds of interest have been studied by means of the developed CE method. The results obtained by CE have been compared with inductively coupled plasma in order to validate this newly developed method. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science B.V.