Low-Temperature Thermal History Using Fission Track Dating in Three Wells in Southern Alaska Offshore Basins: Lower Cook Inlet, Shelikof Strait, and Stevenson Trough
Titel:
Low-Temperature Thermal History Using Fission Track Dating in Three Wells in Southern Alaska Offshore Basins: Lower Cook Inlet, Shelikof Strait, and Stevenson Trough
Auteur:
Murphy, John M. Clough, James G.
Verschenen in:
Marine georesources & geotechnology
Paginering:
Jaargang 17 (1999) nr. 2-3 pagina's 271-281
Jaar:
1999-01-01
Inhoud:
Three wells, all offshore, in southern Alaska studied using apatite fission track dating make a transect southward from Lower Cook Inlet to the Kodiak Shelf and include ARCO Lower Cook Inlet COST #1 well (LCI well), Chevron OCS-0248 #1A well (Shelikof Strait), and Kodiak COST KSSD #1 OCS 77-1 well (Stevenson Basin, Kodiak). The ages of deep partially annealed samples from Lower Cook Inlet well suggest that the region cooled between ~100 and 75 Ma and or sometime after. Two scenarios are presented: (1) maximum heating before cooling in Late Creta ceous times and (2) maximum heating before cooling during mid-Tertiary times. Which is better is uncertain from the thermal and age data alone, but mid-Tertiary or later uplift, erosion, and cooling is preferred because data from Shelikof well suggests that the mid-Cretaceous unconformity was minor relative to the mid-Tertiary unconformity. Finally, because of the ~12 C warmer past than present bottom-hole temperature, the base of the LCI well is now ~500 m shallower than during maximum, burial (12 C/24 C/km geothermal gradient). Single-grain apatite fission track ages (20-25 Ma) from deep in the Shelikof well approach the age of the overlying mid-Tertiary (Miocene; ~23 Ma) unconform ity, suggesting significant and rapid exhumation. This suggests that strongly annealed, once deeply buried strata were uplifted and cooled quickly prior to onlap of the unconformity. The Miocene unconformity, therefore, is interpreted to be the major unconformity in the Shelikof well section. In this scenario the section was buried deepest, and was therefore hottest, until the onset of mid-Tertiary erosion. Approximately 665 m of late Tertiary and Quaternary strata have since been deposited in Shelikof Strait and have reburied the Shelikof section to within ~536 m of its original maximum burial depth. Including modern water depth, the Shelikof well section has experienced ~1 km of burial+submergence since ~25 Ma (832 m section+166 m water=998 m). It follows that the depth to the base of the well is now ~290 m shallower than it would have been during maximum burial. Single-grain apatite fission track ages deep in the Kodiak KSSD1 well are as young as 20-25 Ma and approach the age of overlap of a mid-Miocene regional unconformity (<23 Ma). The deepest Eocene samples were exhumed to within 574 m of the Miocene unconformity surface during Miocene time and were reburied by ~1.7 km of late Tertiary strata. The total section before exhumation was ~5 km; this suggests that Oligocene-age deposits may have existed in the Stevenson Basin. Together with the known Eocene strata, such deposits were exhumed during ~4.4 km of uplift and erosion during a short interval culminating in early to middle Miocene times (>25-23 Ma). Unique and anomalous apatite compositions (high F-, low Cl-, moderate OH-) from the Eocene section could provide a chemical tracer for determining their sediment source along the northeast Pacific rim prior to translation and accretion.
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