Episodic fluid migration in the Fennoscandian Shield recorded by stable isotopes, rare earth elements and fluid inclusions in fracture minerals at Forsmark, Sweden

Drilling through the Palaeoproterozoic bedrock at Forsmark, central Sweden, during the site investigation for a potential geological repository of highly radioactive nuclear waste has provided high quality drill-core material from the upper 1 km of the Fennoscandian Shield. Analyses of stable isotopes (δ13C, δ18O, δ34S, 87Sr/86Sr), rare earth elements and fluid inclusions in fracture filling calcite and pyrite from these drill cores have resulted in the discrimination of several episodes of fracture mineralisations. These events represent migration of fluids during a wide range of conditions, ranging from high-temperature hydrothermal to present-day groundwater circulation. Four major events have been distinguished: 1) Precipitation of epidote, chlorite and quartz under hydrothermal conditions (T > 150–200 °C) during the Proterozoic, sometime between 1.8 and 1.1 Ga. 2) Hydrothermal circulation at temperatures close to 200 °C with precipitation of adularia, albite, prehnite, laumontite, calcite and chlorite. Most of these minerals precipitated during a tectonothermal event between 1.1 and 1.0 Ga, possibly in response to far-field effects of the Sveconorwegian orogeny. 3) Precipitation of mainly quartz, calcite, pyrite and asphaltite occurred during the Palaeozoic, at temperatures between 60 and 190 °C (mainly at < 100 °C). Mixing of a fluid emanating from an organic rich overlying sedimentary cover and a deep basinal fluid from the crystalline bedrock is suggested to have caused this precipitation, possibly as a far-field response to the Caledonian orogeny and/or the development of the Caledonian foreland basin. 4) The youngest generation of fracture minerals is associated with formation of clay minerals and calcite with minor occurrences of pyrite and goethite. These minerals have probably precipitated episodically during a long time period (possibly from the Late Palaeozoic to the present) from various fluids at low temperature conditions (< 50 °C). Few calcites in equilibrium with the present groundwater suggest that the ongoing precipitation of calcite is very limited.