Person: Jordan F. Clark

Project Description

Data Project Maintainers

Abstract

Numerous field, laboratory, and modeling studies have explored the flows of fluid, heat, and solutes during seafloor hydrothermal circulation, but it has been challenging to determine transport rates and flow directions within natural systems. Here we present results from the first cross-hole tracer experiment in the upper oceanic crust, using four subseafloor borehole observatories equipped with autonomous samplers to track the transport of a dissolved tracer (sulfur hexafluoride, SF₆) injected into a ridge-flank hydrothermal system. During the first three years after tracer injection, SF₆ was transported both north and south through the basaltic aquifer. The observed tracer transport rate of ∼2–3 m/day is orders of magnitude greater than bulk rates of flow inferred from thermal and chemical observations and calculated with coupled fluid-heat flow simulations. Taken together, these results suggest that the effective porosity of the upper volcanic crust through which much tracer was transported is <1%, with fluid flowing rapidly along a few well-connected channels. This is consistent with the heterogeneous (layered, faulted, and/or fractured) nature of the volcanic upper oceanic crust.

Abstract

Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP) Expedition 327 (summer 2010) was designed to resolve the nature of fluid-rock interactions in young, upper volcanic crust on the eastern flank of the Juan de Fuca Ridge. Expedition 327 drilled, cased and cored two new basement holes, conducted hydrogeologic experiments, and installed subseafloor borehole observatories (Circulation Obviation Retrofit Kits, CORKs). These CORKs were intended to allow borehole conditions to recover to a more natural state after the dissipation of disturbances caused by drilling, casing, and other operations; provide a long-term monitoring and sampling presence for determining fluid pressure, temperature, composition, and microbiology; and facilitate the completion of active experiments to resolve crustal hydrogeologic conditions and processes. Expedition 327 was followed (summer 2011) by R/V Atlantis Expedition AT18-07, with the remotely-operated vehicle (ROV) Jason, to service these CORKs, collect subseafloor pressure data, recover and deploy autonomous fluid and microbial samplers, collect large volumes of borehole fluids, and initiate a cross-hole hydrogeologic experiment using an electromagnetic flow meter. In addition, Atlantis Expedition AT18-07 refurbished an old CORK that could not be replaced during IODP Expedition 327, completing a critical part of the three-dimensional observation network that is currently being used to monitor a large-scale, directional formation response to long-term fluid flow from the crust.

Abstract

Multiple tracers were pumped into upper basement around Hole U1362B during Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP) Expedition 327 as part of a single- and cross-hole tracer experiment on the eastern flank of Juan de Fuca Ridge. Tracers injected were sulfur hexafluoride (dissolved gas), cesium chloride hexahydrate, erbium chloride, and holmium chloride hexahydrate (solutes), and several sizes of fluorescent microspheres and fluorescent-stained microbes filtered from surface seawater (particles). Tracers were injected as part of a 24 h pumping experiment intended to test a large volume of basement rock around Hole U1362B. We report on the design of the tracer experiment, methods used to prepare and inject tracers using shipboard mud and cement pump systems, and tools developed to permit shipboard and downhole sampling of injectate. Shore-based analysis of injectate samples will be essential for interpretation of long-term samples collected from subseafloor borehole observatories (“CORKs”). Borehole samples are being collected continuously within a long-term CORK installed in Hole U1362B after tracer injection was complete and within similar CORK systems installed in nearby boreholes before and during Expedition 327. CORK servicing expeditions are currently planned for summer 2011 and 2012. These expeditions and additional work in subsequent years will provide data and samples that will permit a quantitative assessment of tracer transport behavior in the upper ocean crust.