LAUSR

A method for determination of organic chlorides in hydrogen for fuel cell vehicles by GC coupled with ion mobility spectrometry was established. Organic chlorides were separated by a non-polar GC column and detected in the negative ion mode of ion mobility spectrometer. The effect of operating parameters of ion mobility spectrometer including drift gas flow rate and drift tube temperature on sensitivity and resolution were evaluated. Under the optimized conditions, the detection limits of seven organic chlorides were from 0.65 nmol/mol to 6.73 nmol/mol, which met the requirement of detection for specification limit of 50 nmol/mol of total halogen impurities in hydrogen for fuel cell vehicles. Compared with GC-MS, and GC coupled with electron capture detector under the same GC conditions, GC coupled with ion mobility spectrometry method demonstrated higher sensitivity for detection of organic chlorides under study. Based on the portability of the device and its detection capabilities, GC coupled with ion mobility spectrometry has the potential to perform on-line detection of impurities in hydrogen for fuel cell vehicles. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.