Quantum Sensing - Ground, and Aquifer Monitoring for Environmental Sciences (QS-GAMES)

量子传感 - 环境科学地面和含水层监测 (QS-GAMES)

• 批准号: EP/X036472/1
• 负责人: Nicole Metje
• 金额: $ 77.55万
• 依托单位: University of Birmingham
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2023 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=EP%2FX036472%2F1
• 关键词: Quantum; Sensing; Ground; Aquifer; Monitoring

A secure and safe supply of potable water is crucial to the health and well-being of the population, yet this is hampered by limited knowledge of the hydrological process including groundwater changes. Not only having a better understanding of the source of our water supply is crucial, but also ensuring no precious water is lost or wasted on route to consumers. Worldwide though, leakage rates are between 20-30% wasting a precious resource. Recent climate change has led to more droughts in temperate zones while at the same time increasing the risk of flooding making the understanding of these factors even more vital. Invisible water storage such as in aquifers is the main source of uncertainty in future prediction capabilities of hydrological and climate models. Also, understanding water changes in peatland areas can help us restore and maintain these precious natural sites thereby ensuring the embedded carbon remains trapped and is not exposed to the atmosphere. Peatland restoration can significantly contribute to our ability to store carbon in the future.QS-GAMES will develop a transformative approach using novel quantum technology (QT) gravity gradiometer sensors for the detection of "invisible" water in soils such as monitoring of groundwater and aquifer levels and leak detection in buried water pipes. QS-GAMES will create a scientific evidence base for the use of cold atom gravity gradiometer sensors for these applications, trialling them alongside other sensing and data processing techniques to create more accurate mapping of subsurface water with a higher spatial resolution, transforming our understanding of the hydrological process and ensuring a robust supply of potable water in the future.To achieve these goals, the project utilises a wide ranging and diverse group of researchers who will work collaboratively, with expertise in QT sensor development, geophysics, buried utilities, hydrology, environmental monitoring, data processing and machine learning. The project has five main work packages:1. Management and dissemination: This will provide steer to the project through the both the researchers on the project and a steering committee of industrial advisors, as well as engage with industrial stakeholders, end users and wider academic communities. It will review risks, dissemination activities and monitor progress.2. Sensor optimisation and validation trials: This will evaluate the use of QT gravity gradient and MEMS gravimeter sensors using controlled scaled experiments in the National Buried Infrastructure facility and determine the optimum parameters for measurement of water in the ground using these sensors for both aquifers and leaking pipes.3. Application Trials: This will test both the novel and existing sensors on well characterised test sites with extensive arrays of sensors providing benchmarking data and methodologies for the QT sensors. This will help identify additional survey challenges associated with significant variations in the ground as well as additional noise sources from environmental conditions and assess how the QT sensors can operate at optimised performance in this environment.4. Data, hydrological and water flow through soil modelling: This will look to exploit the benefits of novel and existing sensor data by fusing multiple datasets to infer ground conditions more accurately, improving groundwater modelling and developing real time creation of gravity maps. The additional data will significantly enhance our groundwater models thereby providing more confidence in the temporal and spatial variability of the water flow.5. Survey Methodologies and Guidelines: This will focus on developing methodologies suitable for the collection of time lapse gravity for the different survey applications. It will establish a quality control framework for gravity data and produce guidelines for practitioners to ensure rapid uptake of the technology in the application areas addressed.

安全且安全的饮用水供应对于人口的健康和福祉至关重要，但是这受到对水文过程（包括地下水变化）的了解有限的了解。不仅对我们的供水来源有更好的了解至关重要，而且还确保不会在去消费者的途中浪费或浪费宝贵的水。但是，在全球范围内，泄漏率在20-30％之间浪费了宝贵的资源。最近的气候变化导致温带地区的干旱更多，同时增加了洪水的风险，使对这些因素的理解更加重要。在水文和气候模型的未来预测能力中，含水层等无形的储存是不确定性的主要来源。同样，了解泥炭地地区的水变化可以帮助我们恢复和维护这些珍贵的天然地点，从而确保嵌入的碳仍然被困，并且不会暴露于大气中。泥炭地恢复可以极大地有助于我们将来存储碳的能力。QS游戏将使用新颖的量子技术（QT）重力梯度仪传感器开发一种变革性方法，以检测土壤中的“不可见”水，例如监测地下水和含水层的水平，并在埋水管中检测漏水。 QS-GAMES will create a scientific evidence base for the use of cold atom gravity gradiometer sensors for these applications, trialling them alongside other sensing and data processing techniques to create more accurate mapping of subsurface water with a higher spatial resolution, transforming our understanding of the hydrological process and ensuring a robust supply of potable water in the future.To achieve these goals, the project utilises a wide ranging and diverse group of researchers who will work合作，具有QT传感器开发，地球物理学，掩埋公用事业，水文学，环境监测，数据处理和机器学习方面的专业知识。该项目有五个主要工作包：1。管理和传播：这将通过该项目的研究人员和工业顾问指导委员会，以及与工业利益相关者，最终用户和更广泛的学术社区互动。它将审查风险，传播活动并监控进度。2。传感器优化和验证试验：这将评估QT重力梯度和MEMS重量表传感器的使用，并使用国家埋藏的基础设施设施中的受控缩放实验来确定使用这些传感器和漏水管道和泄漏管道的最佳参数。申请试验：这将在具有良好表征的测试站点上测试新颖和现有的传感器，并具有广泛的传感器阵列，为QT传感器提供基准测试和方法。这将有助于确定与地面发生重大变化以及环境条件中的其他噪声源相关的其他调查挑战，并评估QT传感器如何在此环境中以优化性能运行。4。数据，水文和水流通过土壤建模：这将通过融合多个数据集更准确地推断地面条件，从而改善地下水建模并开发重力图的实时创建重力图，从而利用新颖和现有传感器数据的好处。附加数据将显着增强我们的地下水模型，从而对水流的时间和空间变异性提供更大的信心。5。调查方法和指南：这将着重于开发适合用于收集不同调查申请的时间失误重力的方法。它将为重力数据建立质量控制框架，并为从业人员制定指南，以确保在所解决的应用领域中快速吸收该技术。