Palynology and deposition in the Wandel Sea Basin, eastern North Greenland

Author(s):  
Lars Stemmerik

NOTE: This article was published in a former series of GEUS Bulletin. Please use the original series name when citing this article, for example: Stemmerik, L. (2000). Palynology and deposition in the Wandel Sea Basin, eastern North Greenland. Geology of Greenland Survey Bulletin, 187, 1-6. https://doi.org/10.34194/ggub.v187.5191 _______________ This collection of papers adds to the understanding of the stratigraphic, depositional and structural history of the Wandel Sea Basin in eastern North Greenland (Fig. 1). Most importantly, the ages of the initial (Carboniferous) and final (Palaeogene) depositional events are now much better constrained than previously, allowing correlation with the successions in East Greenland, Svalbard and the Barents Sea. The Wandel Sea Basin was an area of accumulation through the Early Carboniferous to the Palaeogene period, located at the margins of the stable Greenland craton where the Caledonian and Ellesmerian orogenic belts intersect (Fig. 1). Two main epochs of basin evolution have been recognised during previous studies of the basin fill: a Late Palaeozoic – Early Triassic epoch characterised by a fairly simple system of grabens and half-grabens, and a Mesozoic epoch dominated by strike-slip movements (Håkansson & Stemmerik 1989). The Mesozoic epoch only influenced that part of the basin north of the Trolle Land fault zone and its eastward extension (Fig. 1). Thus the northern and southern parts of the basin have very different structural and depositional histories, and accordingly different thermal histories and hydrocarbon potential as exemplified by the tectono-stratigraphic study of northern Amdrup Land by Stemmerik et al. (2000, this volume). This study shows that the Sommerterrasserne fault is the south-eastern extension of the Trolle Land fault zone, dividing Amdrup Land into two areas with different stratigraphic and structural histories. Sediments of the Upper Permian Midnatfjeld Formation are restricted to north-east of the Sommerterrasserne fault where they are conformably overlain by Upper Jurassic sediments. In this area the Carboniferous – Upper Jurassic succession is folded in broad domal folds with NE–SW-oriented axes, whereas the Upper Palaeozoic sediments are gently dipping south-west of the fault. Folding most likely took place during the latest Cretaceous correlating with compressional events that also affected the sedimentary basins at Kilen and Prinsesse Ingeborg Halvø further to the north in the Trolle Land fault zone.

2019 ◽  
Vol 67 ◽  
pp. 83-105
Author(s):  
Morten Bjergager ◽  
Peter Alsen ◽  
Jussi Hovikoski ◽  
Sofie Lindström ◽  
Anders Pilgaard ◽  
...  

The Wandel Sea Basin in eastern North Greenland forms the northern continuation of the offshore Danmarkshavn Basin and the conjugate margin to the western Barents Shelf south of Spitsbergen. The Triassic succession of eastern North Greenland, up to 700 m thick, spans the Induan (Dienerian) – Norian. The Triassic sediments rest unconformably on Upper Carboniferous and Upper Permian sediments, and are unconformably overlain by Upper Jurassic – Lower Cretaceous deposits. Based on recent fieldwork in the Wandel Sea Basin, five new and revised Triassic formations are described and included in the Trolle Land Group (revised). The Lower Triassic (Induan) Parish Bjerg Formation (revised) consists of marine sandstones, fluvial conglomerates and sandstones, and muddy flood-plain deposits. It is conformably overlain by Lower Triassic (Dienerian – lower Spathian) offshore mudstones with minor sand-dominated intervals of the Ugleungernes Dal Formation (new). The upper Spathian to Ladinian Dunken Formation (revised) is represented mainly by marine sandstones. A marked erosional unconformity characterises the base of the overlying Upper Triassic (Carnian – Norian) Storekløft Formation (new) composed of marginal marine to marine, massive sandstones and conglomerates as well as cross-bedded and biomottled marine sandstones and minor mudstone units. The Isrand Formation (mainly Middle Triassic) consists of laminated mudstones with minor thin sandstone units that were deposited in slope and basin floor settings in the eastern deeper part of the Wandel Sea Basin in Kronprins Christian Land. The Triassic succession of the Wandel Sea Basin represents a well-constrained shallow shelf to deep shelf / basin floor transect and thus forms an excellent outcrop analogue to the time-equivalent intervals in the western Barents Sea basins and the Danmarkshavn Basin offshore North-East Greenland.


Solid Earth ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 341-372 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jean-Baptiste P. Koehl ◽  
Steffen G. Bergh ◽  
Tormod Henningsen ◽  
Jan Inge Faleide

Abstract. The SW Barents Sea margin experienced a pulse of extensional deformation in the Middle–Late Devonian through the Carboniferous, after the Caledonian Orogeny terminated. These events marked the initial stages of formation of major offshore basins such as the Hammerfest and Nordkapp basins. We mapped and analyzed three major fault complexes, (i) the Måsøy Fault Complex, (ii) the Rolvsøya fault, and (iii) the Troms–Finnmark Fault Complex. We discuss the formation of the Måsøy Fault Complex as a possible extensional splay of an overall NE–SW-trending, NW-dipping, basement-seated Caledonian shear zone, the Sørøya–Ingøya shear zone, which was partly inverted during the collapse of the Caledonides and accommodated top–NW normal displacement in Middle to Late Devonian–Carboniferous times. The Troms–Finnmark Fault Complex displays a zigzag-shaped pattern of NNE–SSW- and ENE–WSW-trending extensional faults before it terminates to the north as a WNW–ESE-trending, NE-dipping normal fault that separates the southwesternmost Nordkapp basin in the northeast from the western Finnmark Platform and the Gjesvær Low in the southwest. The WNW–ESE-trending, margin-oblique segment of the Troms–Finnmark Fault Complex is considered to represent the offshore prolongation of a major Neoproterozoic fault complex, the Trollfjorden–Komagelva Fault Zone, which is made of WNW–ESE-trending, subvertical faults that crop out on the island of Magerøya in NW Finnmark. Our results suggest that the Trollfjorden–Komagelva Fault Zone dies out to the northwest before reaching the western Finnmark Platform. We propose an alternative model for the origin of the WNW–ESE-trending segment of the Troms–Finnmark Fault Complex as a possible hard-linked, accommodation cross fault that developed along the Sørøy–Ingøya shear zone. This brittle fault decoupled the western Finnmark Platform from the southwesternmost Nordkapp basin and merged with the Måsøy Fault Complex in Carboniferous times. Seismic data over the Gjesvær Low and southwesternmost Nordkapp basin show that the low-gravity anomaly observed in these areas may result from the presence of Middle to Upper Devonian sedimentary units resembling those in Middle Devonian, spoon-shaped, late- to post-orogenic collapse basins in western and mid-Norway. We propose a model for the formation of the southwesternmost Nordkapp basin and its counterpart Devonian basin in the Gjesvær Low by exhumation of narrow, ENE–WSW- to NE–SW-trending basement ridges along a bowed portion of the Sørøya-Ingøya shear zone in the Middle to Late Devonian–early Carboniferous. Exhumation may have involved part of a large-scale metamorphic core complex that potentially included the Lofoten Ridge, the West Troms Basement Complex and the Norsel High. Finally, we argue that the Sørøya–Ingøya shear zone truncated and decapitated the Trollfjorden–Komagelva Fault Zone during the Caledonian Orogeny and that the western continuation of the Trollfjorden–Komagelva Fault Zone was mostly eroded and potentially partly preserved in basement highs in the SW Barents Sea.


2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jean-Baptiste Koehl ◽  
Steffen G. Bergh ◽  
Tormod Henningsen ◽  
Jan-Inge Faleide

Abstract. The SW Barents Sea margin experienced a pulse of extensional deformation in the Middle-Late Devonian through the Carboniferous, after the Caledonian Orogeny terminated. These events marked the initial stages of formation of major offshore basins such as the Hammerfest and Nordkapp basins. We mapped and analyzed three major fault complexes, i) the Måsøy Fault Complex, ii) the Rolvsøya fault, iii) the Troms-Finnmark Fault Complex. We discuss the formation of the Måsøy Fault Complex as a possible extensional splay of an overall NE-SW trending, NW-dipping, basement-seated Caledonian shear zone, the Sørøya-Ingøya shear zone, which was partly inverted during the collapse of the Caledonides and accommodated top-to-the-NW normal displacement in Mid/Late Devonian-Carboniferous times. The Troms-Finnmark Fault Complex displays a zigzag-shaped pattern of NNE-SSW and ENE-WSW trending extensional faults before it terminates to the north as a WNW-ESE trending, NE-dipping normal fault that separates the southwesternmost Nordkapp basin in the northeast from the Finnmark Platform west and the Gjesvær Low in the southwest. The WNW-ESE trending, margin-oblique segment of the Troms-Finnmark Fault Complex is considered to represent the offshore prolongation of a major Neoproterozoic fault complex, the Trollfjord-Komagelv Fault Zone, which is made of WNW-ESE trending, subvertical faults that crop out on the island of Magerøya in NW Finnmark. Our results suggest that the Trollfjord-Komagelv Fault Zone dies out to the northwest before reaching the Finnmark Platform west. We propose an alternative model for the origin of the WNW-ESE trending fault segment of the Troms-Finnmark Fault Complex as a possible hard-linked, accommodation cross-fault that developed along the Sørøy-Ingøya shear zone. This brittle fault decoupled the Finnmark Platform west from the southwesternmost Nordkapp basin and merged with the Måsøy Fault Complex in Carboniferous times. Seismic data over the Gjesvær Low and southwesternmost Nordkapp basin show that the low-gravity anomaly observed in these areas may result from the presence of Mid/Late Devonian sedimentary units resembling Middle Devonian, spoon-shaped, late/post-orogenic collapse basins in western and mid Norway. We propose a model for the formation of the southwesternmost Nordkapp basin and its counterpart Devonian basin in the Gjesvær Low by exhumation of narrow, ENE-WSW to NE-SW trending basement ridges along a bowed portion of the Sørøya-Ingøya shear zone in the Mid/Late Devonian-early Carboniferous. Exhumation may have involved part of a large-scale metamorphic core complex that potentially included the Lofoten Ridge, the West Troms Basement Complex and the Norsel High. Finally, we argue that the Sørøya-Ingøya shear zone truncated and decapitated the Trollfjord-Komagelv Fault Zone during the Caledonian Orogeny and that the western continuation of the Trollfjord-Komagelv Fault Zone was mostly eroded and potentially partly preserved in basement highs in the SW Barents Sea.


Author(s):  
Peter R. Dawes ◽  
Bjørn Thomassen ◽  
T.I. Hauge Andersson

NOTE: This article was published in a former series of GEUS Bulletin. Please use the original series name when citing this article, for example: Dawes, P. R., Thomassen, B., & Andersson, T. H. (2000). A new volcanic province: evidence from glacial erratics in western North Greenland. Geology of Greenland Survey Bulletin, 186, 35-41. https://doi.org/10.34194/ggub.v186.5213 _______________ Mapping and regional geological studies in northern Greenland were carried out during the project Kane Basin 1999 (see Dawes et al. 2000, this volume). During ore geological studies in Washington Land by one of us (B.T.), finds of erratics of banded iron formation (BIF) directed special attention to the till, glaciofluvial and fluvial sediments. This led to the discovery that in certain parts of Daugaard-Jensen Land and Washington Land volcanic rocks form a common component of the surficial deposits, with particularly colourful, red porphyries catching the eye. The presence of BIF is interesting but not altogether unexpected since BIF erratics have been reported from southern Hall Land just to the north-east (Kelly & Bennike 1992) and such rocks crop out in the Precambrian shield of North-West Greenland to the south (Fig. 1; Dawes 1991). On the other hand, the presence of volcanic erratics was unexpected and stimulated the work reported on here.


Author(s):  
Jesper Kresten Nielsen ◽  
Mikael Pedersen

NOTE: This article was published in a former series of GEUS Bulletin. Please use the original series name when citing this article, for example: Kresten Nielsen, J., & Pedersen, M. (1998). Hydrothermal activity in the Upper Permian Ravnefjeld Formation of central East Greenland – a study of sulphide morphotypes. Geology of Greenland Survey Bulletin, 180, 81-87. https://doi.org/10.34194/ggub.v180.5090 _______________ Bituminous shales of the Ravnefjeld Formation were deposited in the subsiding East Greenland basin during the Upper Permian. The shales are exposed from Jameson Land in the south (71°N; Fig. 1) to Clavering Ø in the north (74°20′N) and have attracted considerable attention due to their high potential as hydrocarbon source rocks (Piasecki & Stemmerik 1991; Scholle et al. 1991; Christiansen et al. 1992, 1993a, b). Furthermore, enrichment of lead, zinc and copper has been known in the Ravnefjeld Formation on Wegener Halvø since 1968 (Lehnert-Thiel 1968; Fig. 1). This mineralisation was assumed to be of primary or early diagenetic origin due to similarities with the central European Kupferschiefer (Harpøth et al. 1986). Later studies, however, suggested base metal mineralisation in the immediately underlying carbonate reefs to be Tertiary in age (Stemmerik 1991). Due to geographical coincidence between the two types of mineralisation, a common history is a likely assumption, but a timing paradox exists. A part of the TUPOLAR project on the ‘Resources of the sedimentary basins of North and East Greenland’ has been dedicated to re-investigation of the mineralisation in the Ravnefjeld Formation in order to determine the genesis of the mineralisation and whether or not primary or early diagenetic base metal enrichment has taken place on Wegener Halvø, possibly in relation to an early period of hydrothermal activity. One approach to this is to study the various sulphides in the Ravnefjeld Formation; this is carried out in close co-operation with a current Ph.D. project at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. Diagenetically formed pyrite is a common constituent of marine shales and the study of pyrite morphotypes has previously been successful from thermalli immature parts of elucidating depositional environment and thermal effects in the Alum Shale Formation of Scandinavia (Nielsen 1996; Nielsen et al. 1998). The present paper describes the preliminary results of a similar study on pyrite from thermally immature parts of the Ravnefjeld Formation which, combined with the study of textures of base metal sulphides in the Wegener Halvø area (Fig. 1), may provide an important step in the evaluation of the presence or absence of early thermal activity on (or below) the Upper Permian sea floor.


Author(s):  
Lars Stemmerik ◽  
Gregers Dam ◽  
Nanna Noe-Nygaard ◽  
Stefan Piasecki ◽  
Finn Surlyk

NOTE: This article was published in a former series of GEUS Bulletin. Please use the original series name when citing this article, for example: Stemmerik, L., Dam, G., Noe-Nygaard, N., Piasecki, S., & Surlyk, F. (1998). Sequence stratigraphy of source and reservoir rocks in the Upper Permian and Jurassic of Jameson Land, East Greenland. Geology of Greenland Survey Bulletin, 180, 43-54. https://doi.org/10.34194/ggub.v180.5085 _______________ Approximately half of the hydrocarbons discovered in the North Atlantic petroleum provinces are found in sandstones of latest Triassic – Jurassic age with the Middle Jurassic Brent Group, and its correlatives, being the economically most important reservoir unit accounting for approximately 25% of the reserves. Hydrocarbons in these reservoirs are generated mainly from the Upper Jurassic Kimmeridge Clay and its correlatives with additional contributions from Middle Jurassic coal, Lower Jurassic marine shales and Devonian lacustrine shales. Equivalents to these deeply buried rocks crop out in the well-exposed sedimentary basins of East Greenland where more detailed studies are possible and these basins are frequently used for analogue studies (Fig. 1). Investigations in East Greenland have documented four major organic-rich shale units which are potential source rocks for hydrocarbons. They include marine shales of the Upper Permian Ravnefjeld Formation (Fig. 2), the Middle Jurassic Sortehat Formation and the Upper Jurassic Hareelv Formation (Fig. 4) and lacustrine shales of the uppermost Triassic – lowermost Jurassic Kap Stewart Group (Fig. 3; Surlyk et al. 1986b; Dam & Christiansen 1990; Christiansen et al. 1992, 1993; Dam et al. 1995; Krabbe 1996). Potential reservoir units include Upper Permian shallow marine platform and build-up carbonates of the Wegener Halvø Formation, lacustrine sandstones of the Rhaetian–Sinemurian Kap Stewart Group and marine sandstones of the Pliensbachian–Aalenian Neill Klinter Group, the Upper Bajocian – Callovian Pelion Formation and Upper Oxfordian – Kimmeridgian Hareelv Formation (Figs 2–4; Christiansen et al. 1992). The Jurassic sandstones of Jameson Land are well known as excellent analogues for hydrocarbon reservoirs in the northern North Sea and offshore mid-Norway. The best documented examples are the turbidite sands of the Hareelv Formation as an analogue for the Magnus oil field and the many Paleogene oil and gas fields, the shallow marine Pelion Formation as an analogue for the Brent Group in the Viking Graben and correlative Garn Group of the Norwegian Shelf, the Neill Klinter Group as an analogue for the Tilje, Ror, Ile and Not Formations and the Kap Stewart Group for the Åre Formation (Surlyk 1987, 1991; Dam & Surlyk 1995; Dam et al. 1995; Surlyk & Noe-Nygaard 1995; Engkilde & Surlyk in press). The presence of pre-Late Jurassic source rocks in Jameson Land suggests the presence of correlative source rocks offshore mid-Norway where the Upper Jurassic source rocks are not sufficiently deeply buried to generate hydrocarbons. The Upper Permian Ravnefjeld Formation in particular provides a useful source rock analogue both there and in more distant areas such as the Barents Sea. The present paper is a summary of a research project supported by the Danish Ministry of Environment and Energy (Piasecki et al. 1994). The aim of the project is to improve our understanding of the distribution of source and reservoir rocks by the application of sequence stratigraphy to the basin analysis. We have focused on the Upper Permian and uppermost Triassic– Jurassic successions where the presence of source and reservoir rocks are well documented from previous studies. Field work during the summer of 1993 included biostratigraphic, sedimentological and sequence stratigraphic studies of selected time slices and was supplemented by drilling of 11 shallow cores (Piasecki et al. 1994). The results so far arising from this work are collected in Piasecki et al. (1997), and the present summary highlights the petroleum-related implications.


1981 ◽  
Vol 106 ◽  
pp. 69-75
Author(s):  
I Parsons

A series of smal! volcanic centres cut Ordovician turbidites of Formation A in the southem part of Johannes V. Jensen Land between Midtkap and Frigg Fjord (Map 2). Their general location and main rock types were described by Soper et al. (1980) and their nomenclature is adopted here for fig. 22 with the addition of the small pipe B2. A further small intrusion, south-west of Frigg Fjord, was described by Pedersen (1980). The centres lie 5-10 km south of, and parallel to, the important Harder Fjord fault zone (fig. 22) which traverses the southern part of the North Greenland fold belt and shows substantial downthrow to the south (Higgins et al., this report).


1974 ◽  
Vol 65 ◽  
pp. 18-23
Author(s):  
J.S Peel ◽  
P.R Dawes ◽  
J.C Troelsen

The north-east 'corner' of Greenland is geologically probably the least known region in North Greenland. Various expeditions have visited the coastal parts but geological detail, particularly faunal information, has remained surprisingly scarce. Initial field work by Koch (1923, 1925) and Troelsen (1949a, b, 1950) showed that a Precambrian to Silurian section - unfolded in the south, folded in the north - was unconformably overlain by a Carboniferous to Tertiary section, now referred to as the Wandel Sea basin (Dawes & Soper, 1973).


Author(s):  
Tonny B. Thomsen ◽  
Christian Knudsen ◽  
Alana M. Hinchey

A multidisciplinary provenance study was conducted on stream sediment samples from major rivers in the eastern part of Labrador, Canada (Fig. 1). Th e purpose was to fi ngerprint the sources that deliver material to the stream sediments and to the reservoir sand units deposited off shore in the sedimentary basins in the Labrador Sea. We used a multimineral U-Pb geochronological approach employing rutile and titanite in addition to zircon to obtain unbiased age data. Th e purpose of this was to characterise the diff erent igneous and metamorphic episodes that occurred in Labrador, which is an area with highly variable geology characterised by the Palaeoproterozoic south-eastern Churchill province in the north-west, the Archaean Nain plutonic suite in the north-east, the Palaeoproterozoic Makkovik province in the east and the Mesoproterozoic Grenville Province to the south. Th e fi eld work was carried out in 2012 and 2013 and the study is a collaborative project between the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland and the Geological Survey of Newfoundland and Labrador. In this paper we focus on three samples from the southern part of the study area where two parts of the Grenville orogeny are found (Fig. 1).


Author(s):  
V. A. Stepanov ◽  

Information on the geological and isotopic age of the Kubaka gold-silver deposit in the Omolon middle massif in the North-East of Russia is presented. It has been established that the Kubaka deposit geological age lies in between the Late Devonian age of the Kedon series volcanites, containing the gold-silver mineralization, and the Early Carboniferous age of the Korbinsky suite terrigenous rocks, overlapping the volcanites and the mineralization. The post-ore nature of the Omolon complex dykes, which produce no significant impact on the distribution of gold mineralization in ore bodies, is shown. According to isotope dating, the following stages of the Kubaka deposit formation are distinguished: the accumulation of the Kubaka suite tuffs (369 Ma); the introduction of subvolcanic intrusions (344 and 337 Ma); the formation of ore metasomatites (335±5 Ma); the formation of gold-silver mineralization (330 and 334 - 324 Ma); the introduction of post-ore dikes (179±8 - 176±10 Ma).


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