Sediment transport and upland linkages in an enormous intracratonic Basin - Insights from cross-disciplinary source-to-sink studies in the Triassic Greater Barents Sea Basin

The Greater Barents Sea Basin (Svalbard, the Russian and Norwegian Barents Sea, the Kara Sea and Franz Josef Land) was about five times the size of the North Sea and filled with enormous amounts of sediments in the Triassic. This is one of the most well-studied and data-rich basins in the world, ancient geomorphology (fluvial channels, clinoforms) is well-imaged in 3D seismic data, and a high-resolution palynostratigraphic framework gives excellent correlations and time-control. This makes the area an excellent place to study sediment transport and develop models for sediment provenance. Most existing studies have however studied only parts of this basin, but in the ongoing ISBAR project, we study the entire basin using an integrated stratigraphic framework and diverse techniques such as seismic interpretation, fluvial geomorphology, detrital zircon dating, sediment mass balance, palynology and petrology. In this presentation, we give an overview of the recent advances made in understanding the Greater Barents Sea Basin and summarize our latest research. These results include variations in amount of sediment supplied to the basin throughout the Triassic, the degree and timing of onset of sediment recycling in the basin, the petrographic and detrital zircon-age signatures of the different sediment sources, and the evolution of petrographic- and detrital zircon-age signatures through time. These variations are discussed in terms of source-area evolution, and they indicate that sediment supply was strongly variable and controlled to geodynamic events in the Urals and West Siberia. Sediment supply from minor, marginal sources (Fennoscandia, Loppa High, Greenland) appears to have varied less through time. Our results also indicate significant bypass of sediment to adjacent arctic basins in the Late Triassic. Upcoming research in the project related to autogenic controls on detrital zircon age spectra, and thermochronology and basin modelling in the Barents Sea, will also be presented.