Building materials and interior decoration products are major sources of emission of volatile organic compounds (VOC), a set of substances belonging to different chemical classes which all evaporate more or less quickly at room temperature: benzene, styrene, toluene, trichloroethylene and other highly volatile substances such as formaldehyde and acetaldehyde.
Micro-Chamber/Thermal Extractor™ (µ-CTE™)
Centexbel runs VOC and formaldehyde measurements on home decoration materials according to :
- EN ISO 16000-2, 9
- ISO 16000-6
- EN ISO 16017-1
Equipment and testing procedure
- seven fully-equipped test chambers have been installed to release the compounds from the samples
- the emitted compounds are collected on an adsorbens and analysed by GC-MS
- simultaneous measurement of surface and bulk emissions of six samples
- quick analysis of formaldehyde and other carbonyls
- the analytic thermal desorption process is treated off-line allowing to place a new set of samples while the previous set is being analysed
Centexbel is accredited by GuT and Oeko-Tex® to measure emission and issue the corresponding certificates.
EN ISO 16000
Centexbel is recognized for the whole range of test standards related to product emissions in simulated living rooms, including the evaluation schemes for the German (AgBB) and French (Affset) market.
Remarks for the handling of samples
The specimens have to be sealed airtight immediately after production and submitted to a controlled conditioning in situ.
For a fast screening, thermal extraction is performed to obtain qualitative results. If necessary, the emission measurements will be accompanied by odour measurements, (e.g. according to VDA-270) to evaluate the sensory properties.
Send your samples to
Centexbel - Chemical Lab
Technologiepark 70
9052 Gent-Zwijnaarde
Belgium
+32 9 220 41 51
gent@centexbel.be