EGU24-3623, updated on 08 Mar 2024
https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu24-3623
EGU General Assembly 2024
© Author(s) 2024. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

The role of post-salt carbonates on salt tectonic minibasin formation

Leonardo Muniz Pichel1, Ritske Huismans1, Rob Gawthorpe1, and Jan Inge Faleide2
Leonardo Muniz Pichel et al.
  • 1University of Bergen, Earth Sciences, Bergen, Norway (leonardompgeologia@gmail.com)
  • 2University of Oslo, Department of Geosciences, Oslo, Norway

Salt tectonics on passive margins is driven by sediment loading and gliding with minimal influence from basement-involved tectonics and is associated with variable and complex salt structures such as minibasins and diapirs. A major enigma in salt tectonics is the origin of load-driven diapir-flanked minibasins, synclinal depocenters formed by localized subsidence of syn-kinematic sediments into salt. How can less-dense clastic sediments sink into the denser salt promoting diapirism at their flanks? We use 2D numerical modelling of lithospheric extension including syn- and post-rift sedimentation to understand the evolution of salt-tectonic minibasins along rifted passive margins. Our results show that these minibasins are driven by the deposition of dense early post-salt carbonates and then amplified during the progradation of less dense and compacting clastics. In contrast, basin-scale salt flow driven by clastic progradation alone, without deposition of early post-salt carbonates, does not produce minibasins as observed on salt-bearing passive margins.

How to cite: Muniz Pichel, L., Huismans, R., Gawthorpe, R., and Faleide, J. I.: The role of post-salt carbonates on salt tectonic minibasin formation, EGU General Assembly 2024, Vienna, Austria, 14–19 Apr 2024, EGU24-3623, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu24-3623, 2024.