The chemical speciation of phosphatic fertilizers in the context of the new European Regulation 2019/1009

The EU Fertilizing Products and Amending Regulation 2019/1009 will introduce limit values for Cd, Cr, Pb, Hg, Ni and As in phosphatic fertilizers. The Directive will enter into force in 2022 with an initial limit value for Cd of 60 mgCd ∙ kgP2O5-1, progressively lowered to 40 mgCd ∙ kgP2O5-1 by 2025 and to 20 mgCd ∙ kgP2O5-1 by 2034. This is the most stringent regulation in the World which outcomes could penalise the phosphorite export from ore deposits with high Cd concentrations. Consequently, the regulation could make unsustainable the Western Europe production of phosphatic fertilizers by restricting the phosphatic rocks supply [Ulrich, 2019], e.g., from North Africa, where most of the phosphorite in the European market is extracted. Up today, there are no datasets comprehensively representing the chemical composition of fertilizers in Europe. The present research has analysed 41 fertilizers from the Italian market, including diammonium phosphates, simple and triple superphosphates, NPK, organo-mineral fertilizers as well as raw phosphorites. Samples were pulverized and subjected to microwave-assisted acid digestion. Elemental analyses were performed in ICP-OES (Na, Mg, Al, Si, P, S, K, Ca, Fe, Se, Hg) and ICP-MS (Li, Be, Ti, V, Cr, Mn, Co, Ni, Cu, Zn, As, Sr, Cd, Sn, Sb, Ba, Tl, Pb, Bi, U). Different methods were tested to optimize the dissolution of different matrices against standard reference materials NIST SRM-695 and BCR-032. The first results show that all samples comply with new standards for As, Ni, Pb and Cr. For Cd (range 0.06-120 mgCd ∙ kgP2O5-1) about all analysed fertilizers will comply with the initial limit value, but the percentage decrease to 75% and to 50% when considering the future more stringent limit values. This situation will inevitably cause significant impacts on the sector.