Occurrence of phenols and phenoxyacid herbicides in environmental waters using an imprinted polymer as a selective sorbent

A monitoring program was developed for the environmental analysis of four phenols and three phenoxyacid herbicides in natural surface and ground water samples from the vineyard region of La Rioja (Spain). An analytical method based on molecularly imprinted solid phase extraction was developed for the determination of the impact of these compounds on the quality of environmental water samples. Different parameters were evaluated and optimized to achieve limits of detection in the 20-90 ng L-1 range for both surface and ground water, with relative standard deviations in the 12-18% range. A comparative study of the behavior of the imprinted polymer compared with traditional sorbents (C-18 and Oasis HLB) in the analysis of river water was performed. The results revealed that bisphenol-A is the most ubiquitous compound (present in more than 50% of the samples), with values up to 0.72 mu g L-1. Bisphenol-F was also detected in several samples (33% of the samples), although in concentration lower than Bisphenol-A. The herbicide 2,4-D was frequently detected in water samples (present in 33% of the samples), with concentrations above 0.1 mu g L-1 in two samples. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.