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TESTING PROGRAMME FOR CHARACTERIZATION OF WASTE –
OVERVIEW OF EUROPEAN STANDARDS FOR SAMPLING, SAMPLE
PREPARATION AND ANALYSIS OF WASTE
IORDANOPOULOS-KISSER M.
TB MJKISSER, Hauptstr.118, A-3001 Mauerbach, Austria,
Key words: Testing programme, sampling, sample preparation, waste sample, European standard
The Technical Committee 292 of CEN with its eight working groups elaborated till now more than sixty standards and
Technical Specifications or State of the Art documents for the characterization of waste. The different standards should be
used in a coherent and coordinated way; therefore a testing programme defining minimum requirements, objective,
sampling, parameters and methods has to be designed before starting with concrete work. The testing of waste shall allow
informed decisions to be made on how the waste should be treated (or not), recovered or disposed. Depending on the needs
of the clients, analysis of waste may have different objectives: Waste producers want to know what kind of disposal is
possible, managers of waste treatment plants need to know, if they will be able to treat this kind of waste, the authorities are
interested in the environmental issues of waste. These different needs of the customers lead to different testing programmes.
The responsible project manager has to develop a testing programme based on the objectives defined by the interested
parties. The project manager defines the technical goals of the testing programme after clarifying the desired level of
information and reliability of the results. According to national legislation the parameters to be analyzed, the scale and
number of samples to be taken, the accuracy of the results in connection with the limit values are laid down in the testing
programme.
In EN 14899 seven steps are defined for the testing programme:
• Define the sampling plan
• Take the field sample
• Transport to laboratory
• Test portion preparation
• Extraction /Digestion
• Analysis
• Measurement report
To reach the objectives of a testing programme, methods of sampling need to be selected or designed, that ensure
availability of representative samples. For this purpose a sampling plan according to EN 14899 has to be developed, where
details of the planned sampling process are defined. The influence of sampling and sample preparation on the accuracy of
test results is proven in laboratory praxis and shown by the results of different round robin tests conducted for the validation
of standards on characterization of waste. Therefore European standards on sampling and preparation of test samples from
the laboratory sample have been elaborated in addition to the analytical standards prepared by CEN TC 292.
In laboratory praxis very often different analytical procedures have to be applied to the laboratory sample that has been
taken according to the sampling plan. For this purpose sub-sampling has to be applied in a way, that the different test
portions are representative for the original laboratory sample with respect to the compounds of interest and the specific
analytical procedures. The representativity of the laboratory sample and of the test portions is of major importance to
guarantee the quality and accuracy of analytical results.
In order to prepare the test sample(s), a number of operations and treatments must be applied to the laboratory sample (i.e.
phase/fraction separation, drying, particle size reduction, homogenization, sub-sampling) in a cyclic way until all test
samples are fitting for analysis. Such operations are in several cases a possible source of error and can change the
parameters of interest unless they are carefully selected and applied. The preparation process should at least ensure that each
test portion is still representative of the original sample with respect to the parameter(s) of interest, as sketched in the picture
below:
Preparation of test portions
(homogenization,
phase separation, drying,
particle size reduction, sub-
sampling)
Test samples
Determination of
parameter X
X
Y Z
Lab sample, with
parameters X, Y, Z
to be determined
X
Y
Z
Determination of
parameter Y
Determination of
parameter Z
Figure 1 Preparation of different test portions out of one laboratory sample
CEN TC 292 is developing just now an umbrella standard that defines minimum requirements on the programme, objective,
plan and report for the execution of a testing programme for waste characterization. This is done with the intent to ensure
reliable and comparable results when using the reference methods that have been developed by CEN/TC 292.
The typical scheme of a testing programme with different scenarios of sampling and sample preparation is shown and
explained in the draft standard. In addition the umbrella standard will help to find the right standard for each parameter and
each step of the testing programme. For this purpose all the standards developed in CEN/TC 292 are listed and assigned to
the seven steps of the testing programme.
The requirements on the overall testing report will be described in this umbrella standard, they should contain at least:
• Objective(s) of the testing programme
• Sampling plan and sampling protocol
• Description and information of the waste materials
• Description of sample preparation
• Description of the measurement methods and apparatus used
• Information about calculation procedures
• Analytical results with information on the measurement uncertainty
• Evaluation of the data in relation to the objective of the testing, compliance with limit values
The central person in developing a testing programme is the project manager: he is defining the testing programme with the
parameters to be analyzed and – in most cases – the sampling plan; he has to act as coordinator between sampling team and
laboratory to guarantee a coherent and coordinated approach; he has to evaluate the data against the objectives of the testing
programme.