Raman Quantitative Measurement on the Cl− Molarity of H2O-NaCl-CO2 System: Application to Fluid Inclusions

Abstract

In this study, Raman spectroscopy is applied to determine the salinity of fluid inclusions in the H2O-NaCl-CO2 system. In the work, various systems are prepared, such as H2O-NaCl, H2O-CO2, and H2O-NaCl-CO2. For the H2O-NaCl system, the addition of NaCl salts decreases the intensity of the sub-band below 3330 cm−1 but increases the intensity of the sub-band above 3330 cm−1. According to the structural analysis of the H2O-NaCl system, the spectral changes are mainly related to the interactions between Cl− and water. After the Raman OH stretching bands are fitted into two sub-bands, the intensity ratio between them is used to calculate the Cl− concentrations (molarity scale) of NaCl solutions. Additionally, based on the measured Raman spectra, the effects of CO2 on water structure may be weak. It is reasonable to ignore the impact of dissolved CO2 on Raman OH stretching bands. The procedure above can be extended to quantitatively determine the Cl− molarity of the H2O-NaCl-CO2 system. To demonstrate its reliability, this method is applied to determine the salinity of synthetic and natural fluid inclusions containing CO2.