Passive degassing of lithospheric volatiles recorded in shallow young groundwater

Abstract

The development of life on Earth has been enabled by its volatile-rich surface. The volatile budget of Earth’s surface is controlled by the balance between ingassing (for example, via subduction) and outgassing (for example, through magmatic and tectonic processes). Although volatiles within Earth’s interior are relatively depleted compared to CI chondrites, the total amount of volatiles within Earth is still substantial due to its vast size. However, the relative extent of diffuse degassing from Earth’s interior, not directly related to volcanism, is not well constrained. Here we use dissolved helium and high-precision argon isotopes combined with radiocarbon of dissolved inorganic carbon in groundwater from the Columbia Plateau Regional Aquifer (Washington and Idaho, USA). We identify mantle and crustal volatile sources and quantify their fluxes to the surface. Excess helium and argon in the groundwater indicate a mixture of sub-continental lithospheric mantle and crustal sources, suggesting that passive degassing of the sub-continental lithospheric mantle may be an important, yet previously unrecognized, outgassing process. This finding that considerable outgassing may occur even in volcanically quiescent parts of the crust is essential for quantifying the long-term global volatile mass balance.