GLOBAL VOLCANISM AND OCEANIZATION
OF THE EARTH AND PLANETS
Monograph
Author:OrlenokVyacheslav
I. Kant State University of Russia Press
14, A. Nevsky St., Kaliningrad, 236041
E-mail for booking: VOrlenok@kantiana.ru
Price: 40 $.
ANNOTATION
In this monograph the author develops his work on theoretical issues
concerning the Earth and planets, the origin and evolution of the World
Oceans, and the structure of the Earth’s crust. He presents numerous
calculations of endogenously produced water and photolytic losses in the
hydrosphere during different stages of geological history as well as
examining initial (Katarchean) and recent (Cenozoic) periods in global
volcanism, their influence on the generation of the sialic basement and the
Earth’s oceanization. The volume and masses of indigenous materials and
water pouring out onto the Earth’s surface have been calculated. The
apparatus for photolysis making developed by the author made it possible to
assess the hydrosphere’s conditions throughout the Precambrian and
Phanerozoic. A relationship has been found between the life spans of the
ocean basins and their areas, water masses and solar conditions. Our planet has never had available
resources for making and retaining (for hundreds of millions of years) a deep-water ocean. Even a
shallow ocean which could cover 80 % of the Earth’s surface due to photolytic water dissipation
could disappear in just for several dozen million years. The author has determined substantial
reductions in the radius of the Earth and planets and in other conditions such as volume, territories,
masses and average density for 4.5 · 109 years, examined the characteristics of early volcanism and
the hydrosphere regime on the surface of planets which belong to terrestrial group, and the planetsgiants.This manual is intended for specialists in the field of Earth sciences as well as students,
postgraduates of geographical and geological faculties of universities and other higher educational
establishments.
CONTENTS
Preface
Introduction
System and non-system units of measurement used in this work
Acknowledgements
Chapter I. Contemporary Structure and Dynamics of the Oceanic Floor
§ 1. Oceanic Floor Relief, Seismotectonics and Volcanism
§ 2. Modern Views on the Nature of the Ocean
Chapter II. Geological History of the Late Mesozoic Seas
§ 1. Distribution of the Precambrian Granite-Metamorphic Rocks in Ocean Areas
§ 2. Paleogeography of Sea Basins in the Late Phanerozoic
§ 3. Paleogeography of the Cenozoic Ocean
Chapter III. Cenozoic Global Volcanism and Oceanization of the Earth
§ 1. Evidence of the Grand Subsidence of the Ocean Floor
§ 2. Determination of the Ocean Floor Subsidence Rate
§ 3. Estimation of the Endogenous Water Inflow in the last 70 Ma
§ 4. The Estimation of the Photolytic Constant of Hydrosphere Dissipation
§ 5. The Estimation of Hydrosphere Photolytic Losses in the Geological History
§ 6. New Equation of the Water Balance
Chapter IV. The Causes of Earth Oceanization
§ 1. Processes of Dehydration and Deserpentinisation of the Earth’s Crust
§ 2. Causes of the Cenozoic Global Volcanism
§ 3. Heat and Water Balance in the Oceanization Process
§ 4. The Impact of the Endogenous Water Supply on Ocean Level Change over the Past 140 Years
Chapter V. Future of Terrestrial Oceans
§ 1.Determination of the Amount of Water on the Earth
§ 2. Why is a Proterozoic Ocean Impossible?
§ 3. How Long will the Present-day Ocean Exist?
Chapter VI. Katarchean Global Volcanism and Formation of the Sialic Complex
§ 1. Pre-Geological Earth
§ 2. Evolution of the Sun
§ 3. Radius Reduction and Heat Loss Variations on the Earth and Other Planets
§ 4. Initial Global Volcanism
§ 5. The role of Short-Living Radioactive Isotopes in the Initial Volcanism
§ 6. The Precambrian Decline in Volcanism
Chapter VII. Initial Volcanism and Water Generation on Other Planets
§ 1. Geological Aspects of the Problem Analysis
§ 2. Terrestrial Planets
§ 3. Giant Planets
§ 4. Titan, Triton and Galilean Moons of Jupiter
Conclusion
Bibliography
CONCLUSIONS
In the geological history of the Earth new and little-known events and processes have induced to
make an essential review or updating current scientific representations on the origin of world oceans,
forming the Earth’s hydrosphere and its losses, history and energetic sources of volcanism, processes
of terrestrial crust formation.
Two stages of global volcanism have been revealed — initial in Katarchean which resulted in the
granite-metamorphic complex of the basement of continental and oceanic platforms (sial) and, the
second, Cenozoic, covering 2/3 of the Earth’s surface and formed modern deep world oceans.
Based on the newly discovered important geological processes, an algorithm of quantitative
estimation of a volcanism and escaped water volume at different stages of the Precambrian and
Phanerozoic in the Earth and other planets was established. As a result, it has been established that the
initial volcanism occurred on the Earth and other planets was caused by a single energy source, which
could be made only by short-lived radionuclides such as 235U. The avalanche of these elements
covered upper ground in the final accretion of the planets. Thus, in the Earth and terrestrial planets
favourable conditions for vast but shallow ocean basins were created.
Shallow-water sediments of late Mesozoic-Jurassic, Cretaceous andPalaeogene discovered by the
“Glomar Challenger” in drill program on the floor of the world ocean allowed the author to obtain the
empiric dependence for calculation rate of ocean floor subsidence in the last 165 Ma.
At the same time the subsidence rate drastically increased (more than once) at the turn of Mesozoic
and Cenozoic eras, from 25—30 mm per 1000 years in the Late Jurassic and Cretaceous, up to 200—
800 mm per 1000 year in Palaeogene, and in Quaternary.
As a result of approximation of the graph V(t) it was obtained exponential dependence in alterations
of subsiding rate of the Ocean floor:
V(t) = aet/c + b
Coefficients a andb can be defined easily in the graph V(t) (See fig. 1).
Fig. 1. Rate of endogenous water escape to the Earth’s surface in the last 165 Ma.
The graph on the right:
0 — water; 2 — floor; 3 — deep water sediment; 4 — shallow-water sediment; 5 — basalts;
A — on wells in the Pacific and Indian oceans;
B — on wells in the Atlantic Ocean (Orlenok, 1985,1998)
An average subsiding rate of the ocean floor has been determined too for the last 70 Ma. It makes
100 mm per 1000 years that corresponds to 0.1 km/106 years. At the same time subsidence amplitude
of the Ocean floor along the basement surface has been shown 7 km.
In a modern ocean and offshore (hydrosphere of the land, glacier, atmosphere etc.) there are 1.6·109
km3 of water volume that 0.7·109 km3 less than was escaped on the Earth’s surface of endogenous
water in Cenozoic time. Then a question arises — where did this huge amount of water being half of
the total volume of the present-day oceans escape?
Only one reason can be found — this volume was lost through the photolysis and dissipated into space.
The calculations show the annual losses made ~ 1016 g or ~ 10 km3/year. If we divide this value into an
average area of the ocean which has been forming since Late Cretaceous up to now (320 · 106 km2) we
obtain a constant of photolysis in hydrosphere equals to Fn = 3.1 ± 0.4 · 107 g/km2 /year. Using this
constant we can calculate irrevocable losses of hydrosphere in a geological history of the Earth.
As a result we can determine that at Precambrian and Phanerozoic times the amount of generated
water was equals of the two volume of the present oceans (3.14 · 109 km3), 2/3 of which (2.24 ~ 109
km3) occurs for Cenozoic oceanization and only 1/3 (0.84 · 109 km3) for the Precambrian and most of
the Phanerozoic.
At the same time, almost a half of the total hydrosphere volume (1.5 · 109 km3) has been lost through
photolysis and dissipated into space. The same amount of water (1.42 · 109 km3) exists in the presentday world oceans. The low in annual meaning photolytic loss of water (1.0—10 km3/year) on a
geological scale of time requires the change in the ideas of existence of the deep-water World Oceans
with close to the present-day water volume during for hundreds of millions to billions of years.
The data obtained also suggest that the water in the present-day oceans and the hydrosphere of the
continents is not older than 65 Ma. At the same time, all water that had been generated prior to
Cenozoic had been lost through photolysis.
If the mechanism of photolytic dissipation did not exist, it should be necessary to invent it, otherwise
the present-day oceans would occupy almost the whole surface of the planet and have a depth of 2.9
km above the continental plains. As a result, today, there would be no continents over the surface of
the world oceans. It would be a different geography and a different civilization.
Nevertheless, the subsidence of ocean floor and the sea level rise still continue at a large rate of 2.23
mm per year or 805 km3 per years. It is necessary to notice that acceleration occurs at the time of low
intensity of volcanism — 2-3 km3/year. The rate of the crust subsidence constitutes1.0 mm/year or
0.1 km/Ma. This rate of oceanization is the fastest for last 70 Ma. Such a subsidence of the crust could
be happened in case of the existence of the decompressed space of astenosphere which arised after
Cenozoic degasation and volcanism.
Let’s determine the amount of non-compensated endogenous water inflow (Tnc) from a new equation
of the water balance [chap. III, § 6], excluding a zero factor of an annual water cycle (E – P – R = 0):
Тnc = L – A + F + Vvlc,
where L is an average sea level over the last 100 years (2.8 mm/a);
A — ice-glacial runoff (0.61 mm/year);
F — the photolysis of the area of a modern ocean (0.03 mm/a);
Vvlc — the volume of annual volcanism — 3 km3 /a (0.01 mm/a).
The value of ice-glacial runoff in the interglacial epoch makes 220 km3 /year. Hence,
Tnc = 2.23·10– 6km/a · 361·106 km2 = 805 km3 /a.
The volume of endogenous water which compensates an annual subsidence of deep hollows (the total
area is 300 · 106 km2) between the continental margins can be determined from an equation [chap. III,
§ 2]:
V(t)t = 0 = V(0)·et/c + b ,
where the value V(t)t = 0 = V(0). It is defined from the graph V(t) and makes now 1 mm/year. The
hollows of the world oceans increase in volume annually that is equaled to the volume of endogenous
water which compensates it:
V(0) = 300 · 106 km2 · 10– 6 km/a = 300 km3/a.
Thus, the total volume of endogenous water inflows is:
Тc + Тnc = 300 km3/a + 805 km3/a = 1105 km3/a.
In the course of the oceanization the volume of the Earth crust which had subsided into the
asthenosphere of deep sea hollows has made:
Vec = 300 · 106 km2 · 7 km = 2.1 · 109 km3.
The volume of the water taken out from the asthenosphere and vulcanites is:
Vast = 2.24 · 109 km3 + 0.78 · 109 km2 = 3.02 · 109 km3.
The comparison of the received volumes indicates the deficiency in masses of 0.92·109 km3 in terms
of volume in the asthenosphere now !
The occurrence of this huge loosened space in the asthenosphere specifies features of a final stage of
the Earth oceanization. If 10 % of water masses in the magma and 5 % of gaseous substances are
added to volcanic plate-basalts masses, the total volume of vulcanites will be 0.90 · 109 km3.
When we compare this value to volume of the loosened massess we can conclude that the nature mass
deficiency in the asthenosphere was caused by ejecting volcanic material, first of all!
Thus, there is a possibility that the time in the course of which the Earth oceanization will come to the
end will be determined:
t = 920 · 106 km3/1105 km3/a = 832 Ka!
For these years the Earth crust under oceans has been subsiding another 830m and its volume will
make 250 · 106 km3.
Thus, 430 · 106 km3 of volcanic rocks and water was escaped while 1 km of the Earth crust subsided
in the Cenozoic. In the final stage of the oceanization for 1 km of subsidence 1.105 · 106 km3 was
escaped, i. e. 2.6 times more.
Let's define the amplitude of the Earth crust subsidence within those areas of the ocean with tectonic
activity and quieter parts of the floor in the deep-water hollows. The area of the present-day
oceanization is characterized by seismotectonic activity and volcanism. It passes today on midoceanic ridges, island arches and continental periphery of the Pacific. The area of the first ones can be
estimated as 100 Mkm2, the second — 200 Mkm2 approximately.
Let’s assume that in the areas of modern oceanization the volume of the subsiding crust makes 200
Mkm3, in other areas — about 50 Mkm3. Based on this we can determine an amplitude of the Earth
crust subsidence in the areas of oceanization:
200 · 106 km3/100 · 106 km2 = 2 km.
The floor of deep hollows will be subsiding 250 m more:
50 · 106 km3/200 · 106 km2 = 0.25 km.
Hence, the modern areas of mid-ocean ridges, island arches and periphery of the Pacific will be
subjected by the increasing activity of seismotectonics and volcanism for the next 800 Ka!
Finally, we should define the future size and depth of the oceans. Let’s estimate the volume of noncompensated endogenously produced water which will pour out onto the Earth surface in the next 830
Ka:
805 km3/a · 830 · 103Ka = 670 · 106 km3.
Let's define the sizes and depth of the future ocean. At the area of flooding about 500 M km2 the depth
of such world oceans will make:
670 · 106 km3/500 · 106 km2 = 1.34 km!
Thus, by the end of oceanization in a few hundred thousand years almost whole Earth surface and all
the continents will lie under the world ocean floors. But this time the photolysis will not be able to
help the civilization in escaping flooding its living environment because too less time will remain till
the end of oceanization.
The world oceans will exist for about 40 Ma before the photolysis will have taken it up. On the
surface a deep-water ocean will remain within the present-day areas and depths. Another 150 Ma will
be required for its photolytic losses.
Conducted researches indicate still sufficient Earth resources to change the geography of its surface
radically. But it will be another geography and another civilization.
По вопросам приобретения работы контакт по email с автором.