P.A. Fernández‐Mendiola

University of the Basque Country

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J. García‐Mondéjar

University of the Basque Country

M.A. López-Horgue

University of the Basque Country

Hugh Owen

Natural History Museum

Irene Gómez-Pérez

Society of Economic Geologists

Arantza Aranburu

University of the Basque Country

Isabel Pérez Millán

University of Alicante

Eneko Iriarte

Centro de Epilepsia y Neurocirugía Funcional

Bruno Caline

Fondation de Coopération Scientifique

Jone Mendicoa

University of the Basque Country

Idoia Rosales

Instituto Geológico y Minero de España

Cooperative Institutions

University of the Basque Country

Total (France)

IFP Énergies nouvelles

Sorbonne Université

Universitat de València

Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg

ETH Zurich

Universidad de Burgos

Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique

Fondation de Coopération Scientifique

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Carbonate platform growth influenced by contemporaneous basaltic intrusion (Albian of Larrano, Spain)

Sedimentology (2003)

P.A. Fernández‐Mendiola J. García‐Mondéjar

Abstract Carbonate platform growth in active tectonic settings may be strongly influenced by the structural evolution of the basin, including volcanic activity. In this paper, the sedimentary–tectonic evolution of the Duranguesado carbonate platform (Larrano) in northern Spain is described, and an evolutionary depositional model is presented. The Albian Duranguesado carbonate platform deposits are dominated by rudist and coral limestones with small intervening argillaceous limestone‐filled troughs (10–30 m deep). The platform succession is divided into two parts. The lower platform deposits were intruded by volcanics and tilted before the deposition of the upper platform succession. A volcanic vent plug filling an upward‐flaring pipe occurs in the lower carbonate platform succession. The timing of intrusion is well constrained to the early Albian. Tectonic extension and active deep‐seated strike‐slip faults induced magma ascent at a fault intersection. Sedimentological analysis of these areas indicates that, before volcanic intrusion, they acted as weakened zones of extension, and were slightly more subsident basinal areas. These sites contain anomalous accumulations of siliceous sponge spicule deposits, linked to the release of hydrothermal fluids on the sea floor. After the phase of intrusion, tilting and erosion of the platform and its associated volcanic products occurred. As the intrusion cooled, the platform downwarped, leading to the formation of an overlying perched capping basin bordered by carbonate platforms. Over the volcanic plug, carbonate mounds grew on local palaeohighs. The presence of strike‐slip and magma emplacement in the Duranguesado platform is related to movements between the Iberian and European lithospheric plates, which were accommodated by rotation and lateral movement of the crust along wrench faults.

Carbonate platform

10.1046/j.1365-3091.2003.00591.x

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Syntectonic hydrothermal calcite in a faulted carbonate platform margin (Albian of Jorrios, northern Spain)

Sedimentology (2002)

Arantza Aranburu P.A. Fernández‐Mendiola M.A. López-Horgue J. García‐Mondéjar

ABSTRACT A calcite mass more than 1·5 km long and 20 m wide crops outs along the faulted margin of the Albian carbonate platform of Jorrios in northern Spain. The mass contains abundant dissolution cavities up to 7 m long and 1 m high, filled with cross‐stratified quartz sandstone and alternating sandstone–calcite laminae. Similar cavities are also present in a 50‐m‐wide zone of platform limestones adjacent to the calcite mass that are filled with limestone breccias and sandstone. The calcite mass has mean δ 18 O values of 19·6‰ (SMOW), whereas platform limestones have mean δ 18 O values of 24·4‰ (SMOW). Synsedimentary faulting of the carbonate margin and circulation of heated fault‐related waters resulted in replacement of a band of limestone by calcite. Soon after this replacement, dissolution by undersaturated fluids affected both the calcite mass and the adjacent limestones. Percolating marine quartz sand filled all dissolution cavities, sometimes alternating with precipitating calcite. The resulting cavities and fills, which recall products of meteoric diagenesis, are attributed to a hydrothermal origin based on their geometry, occurrence along the profile and synsedimentary tectonic relationships. The early faulting and diagenesis are related to local extensional tectonism in a large‐scale strike‐slip setting. Movements occurred during the early dispar / appenninica zone of the Late Albian.

Pressure solution

10.1046/j.1365-3091.2002.00475.x

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Depositional architecture of a rimmed carbonate platform (Albian, Gorbea, western Pyrenees)

Sedimentology (1999)

Irene Gómez-Pérez P.A. Fernández‐Mendiola J. García‐Mondéjar

A Lower Cretaceous carbonate platform depositional system with a rimmed margin and an adjacent oversteepened slope was analysed in order to determine its depositional architecture and major depositional controls. The platform is made up of coral, rudist, orbitolinid and algal limestones and, in a 12‐km dip transect, there is a gradation from lagoon to platform margin, slope and basin environments, each characterized by distinctive sedimentological features and facies associations. The rimmed platform is an aggradational system developed during approximately 4·2 million years of fluctuating relative sea‐level rise, and it is bounded by unconformities at its base and top. Internal cyclicity in the construction of the system is evident, mainly in platform interior and slope settings. The seven recognized sequences average 0·6 million years in duration and are related to minor relative sea‐level changes. Carbonate deposition occurred in shallow‐ and deep‐water settings during periods of high relative sea level. Reduced rates of sea‐level rise led to the development of shallowing upward sequences and, eventually, to the exposure of the shallowest parts of the platform during relative sea‐level falls. During low relative sea level, erosion surfaces developed on the slope, and gravitational resedimentation occurred at the toe of slope. Basinwards, resedimented units pinch out over distances of a few hundred metres. Active faults controlled sedimentation at the platform margin, promoting the development of steep slopes (up to 35°) and preventing progradation of the shallow‐water platform, despite high sediment production rates. The development of sequences is interpreted to be related to tectonic activity.

Carbonate platform

Progradation

Aggradation

10.1046/j.1365-3091.1999.00217.x

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Citations (21)

Diagenetic model for fault-related dolomitization in the Cretaceous of northern Spain: subsurface reservoir implications

Stefan Schroeder Stefan Schröder M.A. López-Horgue Eneko Iriarte P.A. Fernández‐Mendiola

Fault-controlled dolomitization has significant impact on reservoir properties in subsurface reservoirs. Origin, geometry, and internal reservoir characteristics of such dolomite bodies constrain adequate reservoir modeling and production. Fault-related dolomites in Albian platform carbonates (Basque-Cantabrian Basin, Spain) provide a detailed analog for subsurface reservoirs.Early diagenesis includes marine cements, exposure and phreatic freshwater cements. Dolomite bodies (<900 m thick) are developed along fault-strike; km-scale branches extend from the main bodies parallel to bedding. Dolomitization is pervasive close to faults, but it follows more permeable trends at distance to the fault. Xenotopic, sucrosic and saddle dolomite occur as replacement and cement. A first generation of calcite is associated with dolomite. Dolomitization was followed by stylolites and telogenetic calcite cement.Petrography, isotopes, and fluid inclusions indicate polyphase hydrothermal dolomitization from basinal fluids moving up deep-rooted extensional-transtensional faults. Dolomitization most likely occurred in the Latest Albian ? Early Turonian at shallow depths and max. burial temperatures of ~80�C. Minimal dolomite precipitation temperatures were 75�C-240�C; salinities were up to 22wt.% NaClequiv.Outcrops reflect spatial gradients of decreasing temperature from deeper to higher stratigraphic levels of dolomitization, and away from a fault. Dolomitization occurred from three fluid pulses, which possibly derived from a single parent fluid. Salinity differences between pulses may reflect variable water-rock ratios during leaching of Triassic evaporites. Little thermal interaction with the host rock occurred during fluid movement, consistent with rapid fluid expulsion. Between pulses, the fault conduit was cemented by dolomite and calcite. Calcite likely precipitated from the hydrothermal fluids at lower temperature than dolomite, as a result of Mg exhaustion and/or a drop in fluid temperature at constant Ca/Mg.The diagenetic model provides some predictive rules for fault-related dolomites in subsurface reservoirs. Body geometry can be tied to its position relative to feeder faults. Hydraulic brecciation, dolomite and calcite cementation decrease reservoir properties in immediate vicinity to the faults. At some distance to the faults, dolomitization remains beneficial for reservoir properties through the creation of vuggy, biomoldic and intercrystalline pore networks.

Dolomitization

Stylolite

Micrite

Dolostone

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Late Albian–Early Cenomanian stratigraphic succession near Estella-Lizarra (Navarra, central northern Spain) and its regional and interregional correlation

Cretaceous Research (1999)

M.A. López-Horgue Hugh Owen Julio Rodríguez‐Lázaro Orue-Etxebarria P.A. Fernández‐Mendiola

Cenomanian

Ammonite

Biozone

Micropaleontology

10.1006/cres.1999.0162

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Citations (39)

Impact of Early Aptian carbon cycle perturbations on evolution of a marine shelf system in the Basque-Cantabrian Basin (Aralar, N Spain)

Earth and Planetary Science Letters (2009)

Isabel Pérez Millán Helmut Weissert P.A. Fernández‐Mendiola J. García‐Mondéjar

Aptian

Marine transgression

Siliciclastic

Ammonite

Carbonate platform

Chemostratigraphy

Large igneous province

10.1016/j.epsl.2009.08.023

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Citations (84)

Tectonic lowstand wedges of a carbonate platform-basin transition (Lower Albian of Lanestosa, N Spain)

Géologie Méditerranéenne (1994)

M.A. López-Horgue J. García‐Mondéjar P.A. Fernández‐Mendiola

Carbonate platform

10.3406/geolm.1994.1538

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Persistence of Coral-Rudist Reefs into the Late Cretaceous

Palaios (1990)

Robert W. Scott P.A. Fernández‐Mendiola Eulàlia Gili A. Simó

During the Early Cretaceous, coral-algal communities occupied deeper water habitats in the reef ecosystem, and rudist communities generally populated the shallow-water, carbonate-sand substrates. During the middle Cretaceous, however, coral-algal communities became less common, and Late Cretaceous reef communities consisted of both rudist-dominated and rudist-coral communities. In the Pyrenean basins and other basins in the Mediterranean, coral associations co-existed with rudists forming complex buildups at the shelf-edge. In some parts of these buildups corals were nearly as abundant as rudists; in some complex buildups large coral colonies encrusted the rudists. Behind the shelf margin cylindrical, elevator rudists dominated the lenticular thickets that were interspersed with carbonate sands. Global changes in oceanic conditions, such as marine productivity and oxygen content, may have stressed the deeper coral-algal reef communities leaving rudists as the major shallow reef biota in Caribbean reefs. However, the co-occurrence of corals with rudists in these Pyrenean complex buildups suggests that corals were able to compete with rudists for resources. The corals in the complex buildups generally belong to genera different from those in the coral-algal communities. Perhaps this ecological stress in the mid-Cretaceous resulted in the evolution of new coral taxa.

Persistence (discontinuity)

10.2307/3514807

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Citations (37)

Aptian-Albian Carbonate Platforms: Central Basque-Cantabrian Basin, Northern Spain: Chapter 25

P.A. Fernández‐Mendiola Irene Gómez-Pérez J. García‐Mondéjar

Aptian

Carbonate platform

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Albian Carbonate Mounds: Comparative Study in the Context of Sea‐Level Variations (Soba, Northern Spain)

J. García‐Mondéjar P.A. Fernández‐Mendiola

The sedimentary characteristics of three carbonate mounds from the Albian of Soba (Basque-Cantabrian region, northern Spain) can be related to the local curve of relative sea-level change. The lower Albian La Gándara mound complex is about 250 m wide and 150 m thick. Three growth phases have been identified: (i) a shoaling-upward lower phase corresponding to a highstand systems tract (HST) and culminating with a major discontinuity surface; (ii) a deepening-upward intermediate phase related to a transgressive systems tract (TST); and (iii) a new shoaling-upward phase related to an HST topped by a major unconformity. Core facies from this complex mound are mainly coral and rudist wackestones with peloidal micrite, whereas the flanks consist of skeletal packstones and grainstones with shallow-water fossils. The middle Albian Casas del Carrascal mound is about 45 m wide and 15 m thick and contains a single deepening-upward cycle. Its core is mainly made up of coral and rudist wackestones and its flanks consist of fine-grained calcarenites and marly micritic limestones. Its top is overlain unconformably by deeper-water sediments. It is attributed to a TST. Finally, the upper Albian La Muela-1 mound is about 200 m wide and 8 m thick, and corresponds to a lowstand systems tract (LST). It shows a small core composed of red algal bafflestones and extensively developed flanks consisting of grainstones and packstones of skeletal red algae. It represents shallowing-upward conditions that were followed by a sudden drowning corresponding to the first transgressive surface (TS). This is the first Albian red-algal mound reported in the region. In the Soba valley mid-Cretaceous series, it is suggested that mounds from LST and HST are characterized by shoaling-upward trends, while mounds from TST show deepening-upward trends. Shoaling trends lead to increased production of flank deposits and deepening trends favour reduced production of flank deposits. Shoaling trends are often accompanied by progradational geometries. However, HST mounds culminate with an exposure surface related to a sequence boundary, whereas TST mounds are topped by a drowning surface.

Transgressive

10.1002/9781444304114.ch12

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Citations (10)