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Continuous versus punctuated vein widening in the Marcellus Formation, USA: the fine line between pressure fringes and hydraulic fractures

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 May 2022

JN Hooker Open the ORCID record for JN Hooker [Opens in a new window] ,
J Cartwright ,
B Stephenson  and
CC Day
JN Hooker*
Affiliation:
Department of Earth Sciences, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3AN, UK Department of Atmospheric Science, Environmental Science and Physics, University of the Incarnate Word, 4301 Broadway, San Antonio, Texas 78209, USA
J Cartwright
Affiliation:
Department of Earth Sciences, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3AN, UK
B Stephenson
Affiliation:
Shell Canada Energy, 400 – 4th Ave S.W., Calgary, Alberta T2P 2H5, Canada
CC Day
Affiliation:
Department of Earth Sciences, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3AN, UK
*
Author for correspondence: JN Hooker, Email: jnhooker@uiwtx.edu
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Abstract

Calcite veins are common in organic-rich mudrocks, but their genesis and ability to transmit fluids are debated. A combined microstructural and isotopic investigation of an array of calcite veins recovered in core from the Marcellus Formation reveals that the veins grew via a combination of continuous fibrous growth and punctuated fracture-opening increments. Continuous opening is the result of pressure-solution creep and involves no mechanical fracturing, but rather the growth of a pressure fringe around a pre-existing, sealed fracture. In contrast, incremental opening is accomplished by overpressured, mineral-saturated fluid, which repeatedly ruptures the rock at the cement / host-rock interface. Punctuated growth increments occurred repeatedly throughout an otherwise protracted, continuous growth history, indicating that the present structures preserve hybrid deformation conditions between brittle, fluid-assisted cracking and plastic strain. Stable isotopic signatures match those of a regional opening-mode fracture set that formed in response to catagenetic fluid overpressures amid a tectonically imposed (Alleghanian) stress field. It is concluded that calcite veins form as opening-mode hydraulic fractures and are susceptible to increments of brittle reactivation, even while inelastic growth processes widen and fill the veins with fibrous cement.

Keywords

calcite veinfibrous veinmudrockEBSDSEM-CL
Type
FRACTURE MECHANICS
Information
Geological Magazine , Volume 159 , Issue 11-12: THEMATIC ISSUE: Faults and fractures in rocks: mechanics, occurrence, dating, stress history and fluid flow , November 2022 , pp. 2020 - 2035
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press

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