--> Abstract: Large-Scale Mud Mobilization: Implications for Mapping and Timing Fluid Flow in Sedimentary Basins, by Christopher Aiden-Lee Jackson and Daniel Stoddart; #90039 (2005)

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Large-Scale Mud Mobilization: Implications for Mapping and Timing Fluid Flow in Sedimentary Basins

Christopher Aiden-Lee Jackson1 and Daniel Stoddart2
1 Imperial College London, London, United Kingdom
2 Norsk Hydro Research Centre, Bergen, Norway

Large-scale mobilisation of both mud- and sand-rich sequences is a commonly recognised process in sedimentary basins. Several studies have demonstrated that large volumes of sediment can be mobilised by the input of basinal fluids from underlying basins, thus mobilisation features can be used to help map fluid flow in sedimentary basins.

Detailed analysis of three-dimensional seismic data and well data from the Oligocene of the Uer Terrace, North Sea, reveal the presence of large (up to 1.5 x 1010 m3) zones of mud mobilisation. Based on their occurrence above gas chimneys emanating from breached structural closures in the underlying Upper Jurassic basins, the zones of mobilisation are interpreted to have been triggered by the injection of gas and formation waters. Units overlying the areas of mobilised mud onlap topography developed above these structures and indicate the mobilised areas were expressed at the paleo-seabed. Furthermore, biostratigraphic data from units overlying the mobilised zones suggests seabed topography associated with gas-triggered mobilisation formed in the Late Miocene. A series of low-relief, fault-bounded depressions are developed in units overlying the zones of mobilisation, and are interpreted to have formed due to deflation of the gas-charged mobilised mud masses during the Latest Pliocene.

The results of this study have implications for the genesis and timing of large-scale mud mobilisation, and the growth and decay of structures associated with this process. Furthermore, it is demonstrated that mapping mobilisation features identified on three-dimensional seismic data may help to map and time fluid flow in sedimentary basins.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90039©2005 AAPG Calgary, Alberta, June 16-19, 2005