Extension structural records in the Qinshui basin (North China) since the Late Mesozoic

Abstract

Qinshui basin has abundant coal-bed methane resources and has been undergoing intensive intracontinental rifting and extensional tectonics since the Late Mesozoic. Some fractures, which were previously considered as conjugate shear fractures, are interpreted as joint sets with extension characteristics, for the first time in the Qinshui basin. The widely distributed joint sets with stable attitudes can be divided into four sets. This paper presents updated results of fault-slip datasets collected in different zones of the Qinshui basin and addresses the changes in the direction of extensional stresses since the Late Mesozoic. Based on the analysis results of the slickenline of normal faults, joint sets in the field, and focal mechanism solutions data from the Shanxi Province, we identified four main directions of extension since the Late Mesozoic in the Qinshui basin: (1) Early Cenozoic ENE–WSW (85 ± 15°) extension; (2) Palaeogene NNE–SSW (30 ± 5°) extension; (3) Miocene NW–SE (135 ± 15°) extension; and (4) Late Pliocene–quaternary NNW–SSE (170 ± 5°) extension. The principal extension directions in the Qinshui basin seem to have undergone a counterclockwise rotation from the Early Cenozoic to the Miocene. We prefer that the extension deformation events in the Qinshui basin since the Late Mesozoic were mainly related to the back-arc spreading induced by westward subduction of the paleo-Pacific plate under the Eurasian continent.