Total Organic Carbon (TOC) refers to the measurement of organic (ie carbon-based) impurities in a water system. Organic substances are substances that contain organic compounds in their structure. They are not naturally present, synthesized during metabolism in the organism. Organic substances are sugar, sucrose, petroleum, PVC glue, alcohol, plastic-based derivatives and compounds. These organic impurities can come from different sources. For example, it may be present in drinking water, it may be due to filtration of water or it may be caused by bacteria formation in the water system.

When performing total organic carbon analyzes, in the simplest terms, organic substances in water are catalytically burned at high temperatures and converted into carbon dioxide. By measuring the carbon dioxide thus released, the total amount of organic carbon in the sample is determined.

At the end of the year, the Ministry of Environment and Urbanization issued an announcement by the Environmental Reference Laboratory on TOC measurements in emission measurements. In this announcement, VOC parameter in Annex I of Industrial Air Pollution Control Regulation requires separate concentration values ​​for each class. Total organic carbon (TOC) also contains volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and therefore the Ministry has authorized laboratories from time to time with TS EN 2012 standard instead of TS EN 13649 in measurement and analysis studies. The full names of these standards are as follows:

• TSE CEN / TS 13649 Constant source emissions - Determination of the mass concentration of each gaseous organic compound - Solvent extraction or thermally monitored sorptive sampling method
• TS EN 12619 Constant source emissions - Determination of the mass concentration of total gaseous organic carbon at low concentrations in flue gases - Continuous method using flame ionization detector

Accredited laboratories now comply with the TS EN 13649 standard for emission measurements. The important point here is that the laboratories have experienced staff and technological infrastructure and perform the analyzes quickly and reliably.