Dating and Isotopic Characterisation for Decarbonisation, Energy, Environment (DICharDEE)

一定体积的岩石形成后，其化学性质可能会因地质事件而改变，从而使流体穿过岩石中的裂缝。这些液体从岩石中滤出元素，可以将它们输送到很长的距离，并有可能形成绿色技术所需元素的富集。为了追求净零碳排放，我们需要利用地下岩石体积的特性。例如，为了有效地提取绿色地热能，流体需要有效地流过岩石裂缝。然而，如果液体可以逸出，我们不想将清洁能源（例如氢气）或废弃能源产品（例如二氧化碳和放射性废物）储存在地下深处。我们还需要更好地了解现代社会所需的将金属集中在岩石中的过程和事件。为了适当地利用我们的地下资源并使我们的能源和资源密集型活动脱碳，我们需要研究岩石中的流体运动。例如，我们需要了解二氧化碳和氢气如何穿过岩石体积以及需要多长时间？哪些地质事件形成了关键金属资源？如何利用这些知识来减少勘探的影响？我们还需要了解，一旦人类通过注入、提取和储存资源与岩石互动，将会发生什么。许多这些岩石-流体反应的空间尺度要求我们能够在比一毫米小数十到数千倍的空间尺度上研究矿物中特定元素的极小化学变化（同位素），并在周围矿物化学和结构的背景下进行研究。这比我们通过科学家使用的典型方法（在实验室中破碎岩石并从矿物颗粒中纯化感兴趣的元素）所能实现的要小得多。相反，我们需要使用激光将这些极少量的样品直接瞄准并采样到仪器（质谱仪）中。然而，我们想要分析的同位素和我们不想分析的同位素之间就会发生冲突或“干扰”，因为它们在质谱仪中的行为相似。这限制了我们回答有关岩石、流体和蚀变的重要问题的潜力。该投标要求资金购买新的仪器技术 - 具有 MS/MS 功能的碰撞反应池、多收集器等离子体质谱仪 (CRC-MC-ICP-MS) - 将与主办机构现有的大量现有激光技术相结合。该仪器使用气体与特定元素发生反应并净化特定元素，在几秒钟内消除干扰，而这在实验室通常需要数天时间，并且可以在必要的微观尺度上破译矿物反应。通过这种方式，我们可以为英国成为利用地下实现净零排放的世界领先者做出贡献，同时仍然提供我们的经济所需的原材料。

After a volume of rock forms its chemistry can be altered by geologic events, that move fluids through fractures in the rock. These fluids leach elements from the rocks, can transport them over significant distances, and potentially form enrichments of the elements we need for green technology. In pursuit of Net Zero carbon emissions, we need to use the properties of the volumes of rock beneath the ground. For example, to efficiently extract green geothermal heat energy, fluids need to efficiently flow through rock fractures. Yet we don't want to store clean energy (e.g. hydrogen) or waste energy products (e.g. CO2 and radioactive waste) deep within the ground if fluids can escape. We also need to better understand the processes and events that concentrate the metals within rocks, that we need for modern society. To use our subsurface resources appropriately and decarbonise our energy and resource intensive activities, we need to investigate fluid movement through rocks. For example, we need to understand how carbon dioxide and hydrogen move through volumes of rock and over what timescales? Which geological events form key metal resources and how can this knowledge be used to reduce the impact of their exploration? We also need to understand what will occur once humans have interacted with the rock by injecting, extracting and storing resources there. The spatial scale of many of these rock-fluid reactions requires that we can investigate extremely small chemical variations (isotopes) of specific elements in minerals at spatial scales 10s to 1000s times smaller than a millimetre and do this within the context of the surrounding mineral chemistries and structures. This is much smaller than we can achieve by the typical methods scientists use where rocks are broken-up and the elements of interest are purified from mineral grains in a laboratory. Instead, we need to use lasers to target and sample these extremely small amounts of sample, directly into an instrument (mass spectrometer). However, clashes or 'interferences' then occur between the isotopes we want to analyse and those we do not, because they behave similarly in the mass spectrometer. This limits our potential to answer important questions about the rocks, fluids and alterations. This bid requests funds to purchase new instrument technology - a collision and reaction cell, multi-collector plasma mass spectrometer (CRC-MC-ICP-MS) with MS/MS capability - that will be coupled to a large-array of existing laser technology already at the host institute. This instrument uses gasses to react with and purify specific elements, removing the interferences in seconds that would normally takes days in a laboratory, and can decipher mineral reactions at the necessary micro-scale. In this way we can contribute to the UK becoming a world-leader in using the subsurface to achieve Net Zero, whilst still providing the raw materials our economy requires.