Analysis of Estrogenic Hormones in Natural Waters, Wastewater and Sludge. Results from the First International Round Robin Test

This paper reports the results from the first international round robin test on estrogenic hormones in 5 types of matrices including groundwater, surface water, influent and effluent wastewater and a freeze dried wastewater plant sludge. The 14 participating laboratories used a wide variety of analytical techniques comprising different extraction, cleanup and separation-detection procedures. The latter comprised GC/MS, GC/MS/MS, LC/MS, LC-TOF MS, LC/MS/MS with ESI or APPI interfaces, and a rather uncommon LC-coulometry method. Overall the results from this first test are rather satisfactory. The most consistent results were obtained with the LC/MS/MS methods, the LC-TOF and the GC/MS/MS methods, while single stage GC-or LC/MS tended to lack sensitivity or specificity. The LC-coulometric method gave significantly different results than other methods.