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Early Oligocene initiation of North Atlantic Deep Water formation

Nature volume 410, pages 917–920 (2001)Cite this article

Abstract

Dating the onset of deep-water flow between the Arctic and North Atlantic oceans is critical for modelling climate change in the Northern Hemisphere1,2 and for explaining changes in global ocean circulation throughout the Cenozoic era3 (from about 65 million years ago to the present). In the early Cenozoic era, exchange between these two ocean basins was inhibited by the Greenland–Scotland ridge3,4, but a gateway through the Faeroe–Shetland basin has been hypothesized3,5. Previous estimates of the date marking the onset of deep-water circulation through this basin—on the basis of circumstantial evidence from neighbouring basins—have been contradictory5,6,7,8,9, ranging from about 35 to 15 million years ago. Here we describe the newly discovered Southeast Faeroes drift, which extends for 120 km parallel to the basin axis. The onset of deposition in this drift has been dated to the early Oligocene epoch (∼35 million years ago) from a petroleum exploration borehole. We show that the drift was deposited under a southerly flow regime, and conclude that the initiation of deep-water circulation from the Norwegian Sea into the North Atlantic Ocean took place much earlier than is currently assumed in most numerical models of ancient ocean circulation.

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Figure 1: Location of the study area.
Figure 2: Map and seismic geometry of the southeast Faeroe drift.
Figure 3: Summary of results from the sampled interval of the petroleum industry borehole 214/4-1 and the corresponding well-to-seismic tie (well located on Fig. 1).

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Acknowledgements

We thank ExxonMobil International Ltd, Phillips Petroleum Company UK Limited, Marathon Oil UK Limited, Statoil (UK) Limited, Enterprise Oil plc, Anadarko North Sea Company, PanCanadian North Sea Limited, BPAmoco, Fugro-Geoteam, PGS Exploration (UK) Ltd and Westerngeco for permission to publish unreleased data. We thank T. Ramsay and C. Harris for discussion of the nannoplanktonic and microfossil record from well 214/4-1.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. ExxonMobil International Limited, St Catherine's House, 2 Kingsway, PO Box 393, London, WC2B 6WF, UK

    Richard Davies & Charles Line

  2. Department of Earth Sciences, PO Box 914, Cardiff University, Cardiff, CF10 3YE, UK

    Joseph Cartwright & Jennifer Pike

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  1. Richard Davies
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Correspondence to Richard Davies.

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Davies, R., Cartwright, J., Pike, J. et al. Early Oligocene initiation of North Atlantic Deep Water formation. Nature 410, 917–920 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1038/35073551

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