Over the last fifteen years, Geoscience Australia, through its Onshore Energy Security Program, in conjunction with Primary Industries and Resources South Australia (PIRSA), the Geological Survey of New South Wales (Industry & Investment NSW), the Australian Geodynamics Cooperative Research Centre, and the Predictive Mineral Discovery Cooperative Research Centre (pmd*CRC), has acquired several deep seismic reflection profiles, which, when combined, form an east-west transect about 870 km long in southeastern Australia. The seismic data vary from low-fold, dynamite-source to higher-fold, vibroseis-source data. The combined seismic profiles, from the western Eyre Peninsula to the Darling Basin, provide a near complete cross-section of the crust across the Gawler Craton, Adelaide Rift System, Curnamona Province, Koonenberry Belt and Darling Basin. The entire region is dominated by east-dipping faults, some of which originated as basin-bounding extensional faults, but most appear also to have a thrust sense of movement overprinting the extension. In the Gawler Craton, an inferred shallow, thin-skinned thrust belt occurs to the west of an inferred thick-skinned thrust belt. The boundary between the two thrust belts, the Kalinjala Mylonite Zone, was active at least during the Kimban Orogeny, with possible extensional movement at that time. The thrust movement possibly occurred during the ~1600 Ma Olarian Orogeny.

Extended abstract of metalogenic implications of seismic and allied results in North Queensland

Extended abstract reporting on status of geophysical work being conducted within the Remote Eastern Frontiers project.

Seismic line 07GA-IG1, described here, forms part of the Isa-Georgetown-Charters Towers seismic survey that was acquired in 2007. The seismic line is oriented approximately northeast-southwest and extends from northwest of Cloncurry in the southwest to east of Croydon in the northeast (Figure 1). The acquisition costs for this line were provided jointly by Geoscience Australia and the Geological Survey of Queensland, and field logistics and processing were carried out by the Seismic Acquisition and Processing team from Geoscience Australia. Six discrete geological provinces have been interpreted on this seismic section (Figure 2). Two of these, the Numil and Abingdon Provinces, only occur in the subsurface. The Mt Isa Province occurs in the southwest, with the Kowanyama Province occurring on the middle of the section and the Etheridge province in the northeast. The Millungera Basin, first observed on two seismic lines in the 2006 Mt Isa seismic survey, occurs beneath shallow cover of the Jurassic-Cretaceous Carpentaria Basin and sits above the Kowanyama Province.

This article presents the results of studies in North Queensland associated with the 2007 Mt Isa-Georgetown-Charters Towers seismic survey. Results include seismic interpretation, geophysical studies and 3D maps, tectonic and metallogenic syntheses and energy potential assessment.

A regional seismic survey in north Queensland, with acquisition paremeters set for deep crustal imaging, show a potential geothermal target beneath about 2 km of sediments. Beneath the sedimentary structure there appears to be an area of low seismic reflection signal from about 1 s to 4 s. Combined with the relatively low gravity signature over this location, this area of low seismic reflection signal could be interpreted as a large granite body, overlain by sediments. This body lies near an area of high crustal temperature and suggests a potential geothermal energy target.

As part of its Energy Security Initiative, the Australian Government allocated Geoscience Australia $59 million in August 2006, to undertake a five-year Onshore Energy Security Program. This is designed to deliver precompetitive geoscience data and scientifically-based assessments to reduce the rick in exploration for onshore energy resources, including petroleum, uranium, thorium and geothermal energy. The work is being conducted in collaboration with the State and territory geological surveys and is scheduled for completion in June 2011.

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