Inductively Coupled Plasma Optical Emission Spectrometry is a technique ideally suited to the analysis of naturally occurring materials, including water, sediments, soils, rocks, minerals and biological matter. The inductively coupled argon plasma is a spectroscopic source, which can be used for the determination of a wide range of major and trace elements in a single, short integration period. Detection limits are low for most elements (typically <10ppm) and multi-element determinations can be achieved in as little as 30 seconds using only 5ml of solution. We operate a JY Ultima 2 ICP-OES.