Meso-Cenozoic geodynamic evolution of the Paris Basin: 3D stratigraphic constraints

Abstract

3D stratigraphic geometries of the intracratonic Meso- Cenozoic Paris Basin were obtained by sequence stratigraphic correlations of around 1 100 wells (well-logs). The basin records the major tectonic events of the western part of the Eurasian Plate, i.e. opening and closure of the Tethys and opening of the Atlantic. From earlier Triassic to Late Jurassic, the Paris Basin was a broad subsiding area in an extensional framework, with a larger size than the present-day basin. During the Aalenian time, the subsidence pattern changes drastically (early stage of the central Atlantic opening). Further steps of the opening of the Ligurian Tethys (base Het- tangian, late Pliensbachian;...) and its evolution into an oceanic domain (passive margin, Callovian) are equally recorded in the tectono-sedimentary history. The Lower Cretaceous was characterized by NE-SW compressive medium wavelength unconformities (late Cimmerian-Jurassic/Cretaceous boundary and intra- Berriasian and late Aptian unconformities) coeval with opening of the Bay of Biscay. These unconformities are contemporaneous with a major decrease of the subsidence rate. After an extensional period of subsidence (Albian to Turanian), NE-SW compression started in late Turanian time with major folding during the Late Cretaceous. The Tertiary was a period of very low subsidence in a com- pressional framework. The second folding stage occurred from the Lutetian to the Lower Oligocene (N-S compression) partly coeval with the E-W extension of the Oligocene rifts. Further compression occurred in the early Burdigalian and the Late Miocene in response to NE-SW shortening. Overall uplift occurred, with erosion, around the Lower/Middle Pleistocene boundary. © 2000 Éditions scientifiques et médicales Elsevier SAS