13 - Role of Fluid Flow on Thermal Regime

Summary

This chapter discusses the importance of fluid flow mechanisms described in Chapter 8 in controlling the local thermal regime of the strike-slip terrains and transform margins (i.e., determining the proportion of heat convection to heat conduction). It continues with an argument about how important it is to resolve the distribution of the primary fluid reservoirs in the system, fluid sources and sinks, fluid migration pathways, and the associated migration rates for the construction of a local quantitative thermal model or at least the appropriate use of a known analog in the qualitative way. This chapter places the fluid flow mechanisms described in Chapter 8 in the context of different tectonic settings and discusses how convective heat transfer controls their thermal regimes. It starts with discussion of oceanic and continental transforms, then pull-apart terrains, and ends with known active geothermal fields located in strike-slip settings and their characteristics.