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Late Triassic to Early Cretaceous Palynostratigraphy of Kong Karls Land, Svalbard, Arctic Norway, with Correlations to Franz Josef Land, Arctic Russia

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Late Triassic to Early Cretaceous Palynostratigraphy of Kong Karls Land, Svalbard, Arctic Norway, with Correlations to Franz Josef Land, Arctic Russia NORWEGIAN JOURNAL OF GEOLOGY Vol 98 Nr. 04 https://dx.doi.org/10.17850/njg004 Late Triassic to Early Cretaceous palynostratigraphy of Kong Karls Land, Svalbard, Arctic Norway, with correlations to Franz Josef Land, Arctic Russia Morten Smelror1, Geir Birger Larssen2, Snorre Olaussen3, Arnfinn Rømuld4 & Robert Williams5 1Geological Survey of Norway, P.O. Box 6315 Torgarden, NO–7491 Trondheim, Norway 2Lundin Norway AS, P.O. Box 794, NO–9488 Harstad, Norway 3Department of Arctic Geology, The University Centre in Svalbard (UNIS), P.O. Box 156, NO–9171 Longyearbyen, Norway 4Statoil ASA, Forusbeen 50, NO–4035 Stavanger, Norway 5Norwegian Petroleum Directorate, P.O. Box 600, NO–4003 Stavanger, Norway E-mail corresponding author (Morten Smelror): [email protected] The Upper Triassic, Jurassic and Lower Cretaceous succession on Kong Karls Land contains common to abundant, well preserved, marine and terrestrial palynomorphs. The palynological assemblages suggest a Norian age for the Flatsalen Formation, which comprises the oldest deposits exposed on the islands. The overlying Svenskøya Formation is dated as Norian/?Rhaetian to Early Toarcian. There are possible depositional breaks at the base of and within this formation. The overlying Kongsøya Formation is dated as Late Toarcian–Aalenian. There is no evidence of exposed Bajocian deposits on Kong Karls Land. The oldest, transgressive deposits of the Agardhfjellet Formation are dated as Bathonian, while the youngest part of this formation is of Kimmeridgian age. The oldest Cretaceous deposits exposed on Kong Karls Land are Valanginian– Hauterivian condensed carbonates assigned to the Tordenskjoldberget Member (Klippfisk Formation). Directly overlying the condensed unit are Upper Barremian, or possibly lowermost Aptian, marine shales of the Kolje Formation equivalent. The youngest rocks preserved on Kong Karls Land are fluvial deposits of the Hårfagrehaugen Member (Helvetiafjellet Formation) and the Kong Karls Land basaltic lava flows. The terrestrial palynomorphs found in the Håfagrehaugen Member support a latest Barremian to Aptian age for the Helvetiafjellet Formation, as suggested by the U–Pb geochronology. Received 07. March 2017 / Accepted 16. March 2018 / Published online 18. January 2019 Introduction successions in the Barents Sea targeted for petroleum exploration (Figs. 1,2). Studies of the Mesozoic succession Marine and terrestrial palynomorphs are established of Kong Karls Land commenced already in the late 1890s as important biostratigraphic tools for dating and (Nathorst, 1901, 1910), and were succeeded by a series of correlation of Upper Palaeozoic, Mesozoic and Lower expeditions in the following century. In addition to the Tertiary strata on Svalbard and the Barents Shelf. The published record of investigations, significant amounts present paper presents palynostratigraphic information of data are stored in unpublished reports from several from the Norian to Barremian formations on Kong scientific expeditions, field surveys and offshore and Karls Land, a group of islands in the eastern Svalbard onshore exploration drillings. archipelago. Svalbard is an uplifted and exposed part of the Barents Shelf and the archipelago serves as an The present paper concerns material collected during important reference area for the contemporaneous an expedition to Kong Karls Land arranged by Statoil Smelror, M., Larssen, G.B., Olaussen, S., Rømuld, A. & Williams, R. 2018: Late Triassic to Early Cretaceous palynostratigraphy of Kong Karls Land, Svalbard, Arctic Norway, with correlations to Franz Josef Land, Arctic Russia. Norwegian Journal of Geology 98, 1-31. https://dx.doi.org/10.17850/njg004. © Copyright the authors. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. 1 2 M. Smelror et al. 5° 10° 15° 20° 25° 30° 35° 40° 45° 50° 55° 60° 65° NORWAY RUSSIA 78° 80° Franz Josef Land Nordaustlandet Spitsbergen Wilhelmøya Kongsøya 76° Svenskøya 78° Barentsøya North-EastAnticline North Barents Egdeøya mlya Basin Central Basin Central Kong Karl Platform Hopen High Novaya Ze Hopen Admiralty High 74° 76° Egdeøya Platform Olga Basin Polarrev High GardarbankenH East Sørkapp Basin High High Fersmanovskoje Sentralbanken High Ludlovskaja Saddle Barents Slope Stappen High 74° DemidovskojeHigh Haapet Dome 72° Bjarmeland Platform Central Barents Arch Bjørnøya Basin Fedinsky High Sørvestnaget Basin Maud Basin M Loppa High South 72° Nordkapp Basin Tiddlyba Barents Signal Basinnken Basin 70° R horn Dome Tromsø West Kola Ridge Saddle Basin Hammerfest Basin Kurentovskij Slope Murmanskij Slope Senja Finnmark Platform Pechora Sea 70° Kola Harstad Basin Monocline Fennoscandia 68° 0 200km 20° 25° 30° 35° 40° 45° 50° Tertiary - Quaternary Basalt Early Carboniferous Pliocene and younger Middle Jurassic - Early Cretaceous Devonian - Early Carboniferous Palaeocene - Pliocene Triassic - Middle Jurassic Silurian - Devonian Eocene Late Permian Pre-Old Red Basement Late Cretaceous Carboniferous and Permian Border line Figure 1. Generalised bedrock map of the Barents Sea and adjacent islands and land areas. in 1984 and the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate in palynostratigraphic data analysed by Fiksdal (1988) from 1993 (Fig. 2; Larssen et al., 1995; Olaussen et al., 2018). a section on Kongsøya sampled by M. Edwards. The Details on the structural setting, basin development, palynostratigraphic data from Kong Karls Land are used depositional environment and sequence stratigraphy are for correlations with the contemporaneous succession in given in Olaussen et al. (2018). In addition to information Franz Josef Land and the Barents Sea. from the 1993 expedition, we here refer to unpublished NORWEGIAN JOURNAL OF GEOLOGY Late Triassic to Early Cretaceous palynostratigraphy of Kong Karls Land, Svalbard, Arctic Norway 3 Svenskøya Upper basalt series (B2) 1 Pyroclastics and Helvetiaellet Formation Lower basalt series (B1) and 78˚50’ overlying Helvetiaellet Formation Basalt intrusions, dykes Basalt intrusions, sills Helvetiaellet Formation Agardhellet and Helvetiaellet formations Mohnhøgda Member and Kongsøya Formation Sjøgrenellet Member Flatsalen Formation Normal fault Lineament Abeløya Kong Karls Land Kongsøya 78˚40’ 2 1 Svenskøya 0 50 km 0 2 km 26˚20’ 26˚40’ 27˚00’ Retziusfjellet Kongsøya West m 2 300 Basalt 2 Kongsøya Fm Basalt 1 200 Mohnhøgda Member Basalt 2 Basalt 2 A Agardfjellet Fm Helvetiafjellet Fm 100 Sjøgrenfjellet Member Flatsalen Fm 0 Vrakbukta A’ A Basalt 1 Basalt 2 A’ Tordenskjoldberget 100 Snøsporvstranda 78˚50’ 0 2 km Figure 2. Geological maps of Svenskøya and western Kongsøya at 28˚00’ 28˚20’ Kong Karls Land. 4 M. Smelror et al. Palynostratigraphic records and central Barents Shelf close to the Volgian–Ryazanian zonations in the Barents Sea region boundary (Smelror et al., 2001, 2002; Bremer et al., 2004; Dypvik et al., 2004, 2006; Smelror & Dypvik, 2006). Results from pioneering palyno-stratigraphic studies on Palynostratigraphic zonations covering the whole or parts the Mesozoic of Svalbard were presented by Smith (1974), of the Triassic succession of Svalbard and the Barents Sea Smith et al. (1975, 1976), Bjærke et al. (1976), Bjærke (1977, have been published by Hochuli et al. (1989), Mangerud 1978, 1980a, b), Bjærke & Dypvik (1977) and Bjærke & Rømuld (1991), Mørk et al. (1993, 1999), Vigran & Manum (1977), while the first record of Mesozoic et al. (1998, 2014) and Paterson & Mangerud (2015, palynomorphs from the Barents Shelf was reported 2017). Bjærke (1977) introduced an informal zoning of by Bjærke & Thusu (1976). As petroleum exploration palynomorphs, Associations (A–F), for the uppermost commenced in the western Barents Sea in the early 1980s Triassic (Rhaetian) to Lower Cretaceous succession of the increasing need for more stratigraphic data initiated a Kong Karls Land. Smelror & Below (1992) proposed a series of studies aimed at providing a more detailed litho- formal dinoflagellate biostratigraphic zonation for the and biostratigraphic framework for the depositional Toarcian to Lower Oxfordian (Jurassic) of the Barents Sea sequences on Svalbard and on the Barents Shelf. Region, while Dalseg et al. (2016a) introduce informal dinoflagellate cyst zones for the Upper Jurassic–Lower Research programmes on Svalbard have been carried Cretaceous in central Spitsbergen. out by SINTEF Petroleum Research in cooperation with several geological surveys and research organisations In the present study we have applied a composite in Canada, Denmark, Germany and Russia, and several palynostratigraphic framework based on documented in-house programmes were conducted by petroleum records from the Barents Sea Region and adjacent areas of companies active in the exploration of the Barents the Mesozoic Boreal and Subboreal regions. During some Shelf. Most of the information from these studies is periods, the faunas and floras were largely cosmopolitian still not published (example: Århus, 1988). In addition, and comparable throughout the Boreal and Subboreal palynostratgraphic information on the Mesozoic provinces. In other periods, oceanographic barriers and succession on Svalbard and the Barents Shelf is found in climatic differences led to the evolution of endemic biotas, several unpublished MSc. theses (Fiksdal, 1988; Dalseg, which do not allow detailed stratigraphic correlations 2012; Ask, 2013; Holen, 2014; Landa, 2015; Meltveit, across and between the biogeographic provinces. 2015 and others). The history of the palynostratigraphic research on the Triassic succession has
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