Encyclopedia of Marine Geosciences

DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-6644-0_100-1
# Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015

Passive Plate Margin

Paul Mann*
Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, 312 Science & Research 1, University of Houston, Houston,
TX, USA

Synonyms for Passive Margins

Trailing edge margin, rifted margin, divergent margin, Atlantic-type margin, geosyncline (pre-plate
tectonic term), pull-apart margin (used by some in the oil and gas community for non-strike-slip,
Atlantic-type passive margins)

Definition of a Passive Margin

Passive margins are the most common type of crustal boundary on Earth with present-day passive margins
having an aggregate length of 105,000 km which is greater than either spreading ridges (65,000 km) or
convergent plate boundaries (53,000 km) (Bradley, 2008; Fig. 1). In general, passive margins are not
zones of crustal tectonic activity and therefore lack associated earthquake activity (Fig. 1).
Passive margins are one of the main stages in the Wilson cycle of ocean opening and their ages, and
ages of deformation are key indicators of the timing of ocean openings and closings through geologic
time. Passive margins are known to contain a major part of the Earth’s hydrocarbon reserves. In their
compilation of giant oil fields of the world, Mann et al. (2003) identified passive margins as containing
35 % of the world’s giant oil fields discovered up to 1999.
Passive margins are sedimentary wedges that overlie an inactive and subsiding weld between rifted
continental crust and newly formed and younger oceanic crust. When rifting continental margins overlain
by passive margins face each other, they are known collectively as “conjugate margins” as shown in the
Black Sea example in Fig. 2.

Rifted Margins Underlie Passive Margins

Passive margins are thick, sedimentary wedges overlying rifted, continental margins. The fundamental
crustal weld or boundary for rifted continental margins is also called a “continent-ocean boundary”(COB)
and can form narrow or broad features – as defined and imaged using deeply penetrating geophysical
methods as seen in Figs. 2, 3, 4, and 5. The stretched continental crust or “transitional crust” is generally
characterized by seaward-dipping normal faults, a prominent “breakup” unconformity that records the
end of the syn-rift phase, and an overlying, post-rift sag basin formed by slower and gradually dissipating
thermal subsidence following rifting. Faulting deforming the passive margin section that postdates the
breakup unconformity is commonly associated with gravitational sliding, rather than tectonically driven
crustal deformation as observed on the western end of the Black Sea line as shown in Fig. 2b.

*Email: pmann@uh.edu

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Encyclopedia of Marine Geosciences
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-6644-0_100-1
# Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015

Fig. 1 Map of passive (green) and active (red) margins of the world modified from passive margin compilation by Bradley
(2008). Stars show largest earthquakes since 1970 that are confined to the active plate margins shown with red shading.
Locations of data shown in Figs. 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7 are indicated

Fig. 2 (a) Schematic section of a rifted continental margin overlain by a wedge of passive margin sedimentation extending
seaward and tapering onto oceanic crust from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passivemargin. (b) Map of the Black Sea showing
the location of the long seismic line shown in c. (c) Deep-penetration seismic reflection image of conjugate, continental rifted
margins of the Black Sea modified from GEO ExPro (2013) that illustrate the main characteristics of passive margins and their
relation to their underlying rifted margins. Note complexities in the conjugate passive margins including downslope slumping
to the west and eruption of late Cretaceous-Eocene volcanoes to the east

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Encyclopedia of Marine Geosciences
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-6644-0_100-1
# Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015

Fig. 3 (a) Major tectonic elements of northeast Greenland from GEO ExPro (2010) showing existing, deep-penetration
seismic data in yellow and planned lines in red. Location of line shown in c is indicated. (b) Schematic section of a volcanic
passive margin with volcanic and intrusive rocks in red from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_margin. Note that layered,
volcanic flows, or seaward-dipping reflectors, prograded onto oceanic crust in the area of the continent-ocean boundary. (c)
Deep-penetration seismic profile (vertical scale is 30 km) showing the volcanic passive margin of northeast Greenland. The
Danmarkshavn and Thetis basins are continental rift basins overlain by a relatively thin, passive margin section. The volcanic
nature of the passive margin is indicated by the presence of sills in the Danmarkshavn rift, the presence of SDRs near the
continent-ocean boundary (COB), and the nearby presence of a “lower crustal body” likely composed of high-density, intrusive
rocks

Tectonic Origins of Passive Margins

The subsidence of passive margins is driven by thermal subsidence of the lithosphere following rifting
and seafloor spreading and for that reason forms the thickest sedimentary environments on Earth with up
to 18 km of sedimentary rock, especially in the presence of deltas fed by river systems draining large
continents. Due to their great thickness and wide extent, sedimentary rocks originally deposited along
passive margins are commonly preserved in deformed, on-land mountain belts.
Passive margins occur as conjugate margins that originated as contiguous areas of continental crust that
become separated by oceanic basins of varying widths and can be reconstructed by removing the area of
oceanic crust and subtracting the width of extended continental crust deformed during the early rift period.
Well-known examples of passive margins include the conjugate margins of the Arctic Ocean, most of the
margins of Africa, Greenland, India, Australia, and the South Atlantic Ocean as shown on Figs. 2, 3,
and 4.
Passive margins are distinct from active margins that are characterized by strike-slip faulting, colli-
sional faulting, and subduction-related faulting along major plate boundaries (Lallemand, this volume).

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Encyclopedia of Marine Geosciences
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-6644-0_100-1
# Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015

a NW SE
Lobo Gaviotin
Passive margin
b
0
Top Oligocene
1 Late Drift
(Cenoroic)
POST-RIFT
2 Top Mid Eocene

Early Drift
(Late Cret)
3 Transition
Top Paleocene
(Barr-Apt.)
4 RIFT (J-K)

5 Rifted
conjugate PRE-RIFT
(Palaeozoic)
6
margin Basement
7 0 50kms
8
c
Passive margin Passive margin
0,000 0,000

1,000 Spectrum 1,000

2,000 2,000

3,000 3,000

4,000 4,000

5,000 Rifted Rifted 5,000

conjugate conjugate
6,000 margin margin 6,000

7,000 7,000

Fig. 4 Conjugate passive margins overlying rifted continental margins of Uruguay in South America and Namibia in West
Africa now widely separated by oceanic crust of the South Atlantic Ocean modified from GEO ExPro (2012). (a)
Section showing underlying rifts overlain by passive margin of Uruguay. (b) Locations of conjugate margins in Uruguay
and Namibia. (c) Seismic sections showing conjugate rift and passive margins

Active margins exhibit plate-driven, active subsidence and uplift, and the occurrence of earthquakes in
linear belts along the plate boundary (Fig. 1). In addition to thermal subsidence, passive margins can
locally exhibit active, gravity-driven deformation that includes both normal faulting in the higher
elevation and updip areas and thrust faulting in the lower elevation and downdip areas. Downdip areas
of thrust faulting are called “passive margin thrust belts” and are a major object of deepwater oil
exploration (Rowan et al., 2004; Figs. 6 and 7).

Passive Margins in Cross Section

The direction of early rifting and continental separation fundamentally affects the cross-sectional profile
of passive margins. Transform passive margins can form above former transform plate boundaries
characterized by transtensional faults, pull-apart basins, and narrow, marginal continental ridges parallel
to the transform fault as observed in the equatorial region of the South Atlantic Ocean. Passive margins
formed above rifts accommodating orthogonal extension are generally much wider that transform passive
margins as can be observed for the passive margins bounding the South Atlantic (Fig. 4).

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Encyclopedia of Marine Geosciences
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-6644-0_100-1
# Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015

Fig. 5 (a) Location of the Santos basin of offshore Brazil from GEO ExPro (2012). Seismic line in b is from within the area of
the red box. (b) Sag basins of the passive margin modified from GEO ExPro (2012). Salt mobilization mainly occurs by
sediment loading onto the salt layer, rather than downslope gravitational sliding

Volcanic Versus Nonvolcanic Margins

This distinction is determined from the amount of volcanism that accompanies the rifting process. Rift-
related volcanism can occur in large piles of “seaward-dipping reflectors” centered near the continent-
ocean boundary as seen in the Greenland passive margin (Fig. 3). Nonvolcanic boundaries lack wide-
spread and voluminous volcanic eruptions and are generally characterized by slower rates of extension
and a higher degree of crustal stretching.

Passive Margin Morphology and Sedimentation

In profile, wedge-shaped passive margins share common morphologies including a continental shelf, a
continental slope, a continental rise, and an abyssal plain, although these can vary in width, largely
controlled by the extensional or strike-slip origin of the margin (Fig. 4). Wedge-shaped geometries as seen
on Fig. 4 result from the seaward progradation of shelf facies into deeper water.
Accommodation space for continued sedimentation is driven by continued thermal subsidence of the
underlying and rifted continental crust and lithosphere. Sea level lowstands imprint passive margins with
canyons incised into the outer continental rise and slope. Semicircular protuberances on passive margins
generally mark the sites of either active river deltas, including the modern deltas of the Mississippi, Nile,
and Amazon deltas, or ancient deltas no longer connected to an active river system. Deltaic settings on

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Encyclopedia of Marine Geosciences
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-6644-0_100-1
# Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015

Fig. 6 (a) Map of the southeastern coast of Brazil showing location of the deep-penetration seismic lines of the Pelotas basin;
the heavy red line is the line shown in b. (b) Deep-penetration seismic line of the Pelotas passive margin fold belt modified
from GEO ExPro (2013). The updip zone of normal faulting gives way to a downdip zone of folding and thrusting. (c)
Schematic cross section of a passive margin fold belt from Rowan et al. (2004) illustrating updip normal faulting and downdip
shortening as seen in b

passive margins are excellent areas for the concentration of hydrocarbon resources due to the merger of
high-quality, “big river” sandstone reservoirs, maturation of source rocks due to the enhanced burial by
the delta, and structural traps related to gravitationally induced stabilities of the delta front. Examples of
productive, large deltas include the Mississippi, Nile, and Niger.

Sag Basins as Transitions Between Rifting and Passive Margins

Sag basins above rifts and below passive margins represent structural and stratigraphic transitions
between the rift sequence below and the unfaulted, passive margin sequence above (Fig. 5). Sag basins
in areas like Brazil are less deformed by gravitational movements of passive margin fold belts and more
affected by salt tectonics activated by sedimentary loading (Fig. 5). Sag basins have been shown in recent
years to be excellent habitats for petroleum due to their more moderate faulting than the underlying rift
basin, their finer-grained facies – including high-quality, lacustrine source rocks and carbonate-hosted
reservoir rocks – and regional sealing by overlying evaporate deposits.

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Encyclopedia of Marine Geosciences
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-6644-0_100-1
# Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015

a Uninterpreted
Northwest Southeast
0 0

2
10
4

6
Depth (k ft)

20

Depth (km)
8
30
10

40 12

14
50
16

b Interpreted Port Isabel fold belt

0 Sigsbee canopy ponded on 0
Isopachous
NW side of Perdido anticline sequence folded 2
10
Sigsbee 4
salt canopy
20 6
Depth (k ft)

Depth (km)
Welded
8
canopy
30
10
Hinderland of
40 Perdido fold belt 12

Parautochthonous 14
50 salt
4–km–high 16
inner ramp
East Breaks Inner basin Inner ramp Outer basin
basement high
Neogene 2 Oligocene Mesozoic 2 Oceanic crust 0 30 mi
Salt
Neogene 1 Paleocene–Eocene Mesozoic 1 Transitional crust 0 50 km
VE = × 3
Zone of Zone of
c normal faulting thrusting

Fig. 7 (a) Uninterpreted seismic line through the Port Isabel passive margin fold belt of the northern Gulf of Mexico from
Hudec et al. (2013). (b) Interpreted seismic line from a showing a large fold forming above the 4-km-high step between
continental crust to the northwest and oceanic crust of the southeast. (c) Schematic cross section of a passive margin fold belt
from Rowan et al. (2004) showing how the extrusion of a large salt mass in the lower contractional zone

Definition and Significance of Passive Margin Fold Belts

Passive margin fold belts are broad zones of deformed passive margin deepwater areas that have resulted
from the horizontal translation of the post-rift cover driven by gravitational failure of the margin (Rowan
et al., 2004). Margin failure – occurring on a large scale and spanning zones that are hundreds of
kilometers wide – is driven by a combination of gravity gliding above a basinward-dipping detachment
and gravity spreading of a sedimentary wedge with a seaward-dipping bathymetric surface. For example,
the Pelotas passive margin of Brazil exhibits an updip zone of normal faults that generally dips seaward
and soles onto a basal, basinward-dipping detachment (Fig. 6). The upper surface of the passive margin
also forms a seaward-dipping bathymetric surface. Sliding occurs on a mobile salt layer. The base of the
zone is characterized by a zone of thrusting that is more narrow than the upslope zone of normal faulting
(Fig. 6). These thrusts also sole onto the same basinward-dipping detachment as the normal faults upslope.
The material between the thrusts is folded and forms large folds at the level of the seafloor.
The Port Isabel passive margin fold belt in the northern Gulf of Mexico is wider and more complex than
the Pelotas example. In this case, the downslope transport of material has occurred on two different salt
detachments with the upper plane largely evacuated of salt and marked by a weld (Fig. 7). A 4-km-high

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Encyclopedia of Marine Geosciences
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-6644-0_100-1
# Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015

inner ramp marks the COB (oceanic side to the south in the Gulf of Mexico is higher; stretched continental
crust to the north is lower) (Hudec et al., 2013). This preexisting crustal ramp causes the salt at both levels
to ramp upward to form a large anticlinal structure in the contractional part of the passive margin fold belt
that contrasts to the smaller and more distributed folds in the Pelotas example shown in Fig. 4. Both the
more distributed folds and single larger fold localized along the crustal ramp provide excellent structural
traps for hydrocarbons in these deepwater, passive margin settings.

Bibliography
Bradley, D., 2008. Passive margins through earth history. Earth-Science Reviews, 91, 1–26.
GEO ExPro, 2010. The northeast Greenland continental margin. http://assets.geoexpro.com/uploads/
e4172077-a931-4725-955a-fafa7c856af4/GEO_ExPro_v7i6_Full.pdf
GEO ExPro, 2012. Perfect Atlantic analogues. http://www.geoexpro.com/articles/2012/06/perfect-
atlantic-analogues
GEO ExPro, 2013. Mysteries of the Black Sea revealed. http://assets.geoexpro.com/uploads/fb83ded7-
634e-4a03-92b4-5e213a94e9e0/GEO_ExPro_v10i5_Full.pdf
GEO ExPro, 2013. The Pelotas basin oil province revealed. http://www.geoexpro.com/articles/2013/12/
the-pelotas-basin-oil-province-revealed
Hudec, M., Jackson, M., and Peel, F., 2013. Influence of deep Louann structure on the evolution of the
northern Gulf of Mexico basin. AAPG Bulletin, 97, 1711–1735.
Mann, P., Gahagan, L., and Gordon, M., 2003. Tectonic setting of the world’s giant oil and gas fields. In
Halbouty, M. T. (ed.), Giant Oil and Gas Fields of the Decade, 1990–1999. Tulsa: American
Association of Petroleum Geologists. AAPG Memoir, Vol. 78, pp. 15–105.
Rowan, M., Peel, F., and Vendeville, B., 2004. Gravity-driven fold belts on passive margins. In Clay,
K. R. (ed.), Thrust Tectonics and Hydrocarbon Systems. AAPG Memoir, Vol. 82, pp. 157–182.

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