--> The Northern Vøring Segment of the Mid-Norway Passive Margin: Crustal Structure and Pre-Breakup Tectonic Evolution
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The Northern Vøring Segment of the Mid-Norway Passive Margin: Previous HitCrustalNext Hit Previous HitStructureNext Hit and Pre-Breakup Tectonic Evolution

Abstract

Rifted margins are among the most important first-order structures on the Earth, because they host about 67% of discovered conventional hydrocarbons (Levell et al., 2010). That is why understanding of their Previous HitcrustalNext Hit nature, thermal and tectonic evolution, and sedimentary infill history, has major implications for petroleum systems. The Vøring segment, as the largest and central part of the well-investigated mid-Norwegian marginal system, is believed to be a classic example of a passive margin with so-called “magma-rich” breakup (Peron-Pinvidic & Osmundsen, 2016) typically associated with extremely thick seaward-dipping basaltic flows and tuffs (SDR), extensive distribution of mafic dikes and sills in the continental crust and sediments, and the presence of an enigmatic high-velocity (Vp > 7.0 km/s) lower crust (Abdelmalak et al., 2015). Various scenarios have been proposed for the dynamic and depositional evolution of the Vøring margin and its basins. However, some aspects of the pre-breakup margin history and configuration, and their influence on the processes related to the earliest Eocene Norway-Greenland separation still persist inextricable. While some researchers (Reynisson et al., 2010; Peron-Pinvidic et al., 2016) consider late Jurassic-early Cretaceous or later hyperextension with partial mantle serpentinization/exhumation in the distal domain of the margin, others interpret the same features as pieces of high-density old Caledonian crust/suture (Gernigon et al., 2003; Mjelde et al., 2016). Such discrepancies in the interpretation of the deep Previous HitcrustalNext Hit levels are partly connected to a bad seismic reflection imaging expressed in ringing effects and poor migration below the sections with widely developed magmatic structures (SDRs, sills and dikes) and at the edge of deep-seated fault blocks and associated detachments. In the current study we use new reprocessed seismic dataset combined with recently released and revised well information in order to get more reliable constraints on the Previous HitcrustalNext Hit configuration and tectonic evolution of the less studied Northern Vøring segment. Subsequent potential field modelling of the selected NW-SE Previous HitcrustalNext Hit transect compared with the available OBS data and expanded spread profiles allow us to evaluate properties of the deep structures beneath the sedimentary cover and test hypothesis about the style of Previous HitcrustalTop deformation and sedimentation in a rifted margin setting.