Imaging of Basalt and Underlying Structures in the Faroese Offshore Area

Abstract

The Faroe Islands and associated shelf area, located on the western European continental margin between lceland and Scotland, are representative of one of the major Tertiary Igneous provinces of the North Atlantic region. Significant amounts of basaltic material was extruded over this area in the Paleocene, superimposing itself upon the preexisting geological structures and presenting a substantial barrier to geophysical exploration in the area, particularly as this volcanic material has not
been penetrated by geological drilling to date. However, recent advances in geophysical data acquisition and processing in 1994 and 1995 have resulted in the production of new, substantially improved data sets which allow imaging of intra and sub basalt units in the more basinal areas. Further, shot records from these surveys have been analysed for their wide angle reflection information in order to constrain the velocity model for the overlying Tertiary section and to study the velocity behavior of the basalt units themselves. This will allow a greatly improved accuracy in the calculation of depth estimates for underlying units. This work has shown that, in certain areas, it is possible to seismically penetrate the basalt units present in
the Faroese offshore environment and define underlying geological structures. resulting in a greatly improved viability for petroleum exploration applications in the Faroese region.