(Table 2) Physical properties at DSDP Holes 44-391 and 76-534

Laboratory measurements on sediment samples and density well logs run at DSDP Site 534 in the Blake-Bahama Basin were used to establish an in situ velocity and density structure. Synthetic seismograms were generated for comparison to reprocessed seismic reflection data in the vicinity of the Site. Uncertainties in the relative positions of the hole and seismic reflection data, velocity corrections, and the composition of the unrecovered section were evaluated. In light of the errors and compressed section, no unique correlation of the seismic reflection data to the drill hole is completely defensible either in this chapter or elsewhere. The preferred correlation resulting from this exercise is as follows, with the Site 534 report correlation shown in parentheses where different. Horizon beta', 887 m; Horizon beta, 950 m (975 m); Horizon C , 1202 m (1250 m); Horizon C, 1268 m (1340 m); Horizon D', 1342 m (1432 m); Horizon D, 1550 m (1552 m). The major differences in these correlations arise from the use of slightly different velocities and hole location relative to the seismic profiles. The Site 534 report results rely on hole placement on a basement flank, whereas in this chapter we locate it within a basement depression still within the uncertainty of the navigation. The Site 534 report also uses drilling rates, CDP velocity analyses, sonobuoy data, and previous similar drilling correlation methods used at Site 391, along with other geologic considerations in arriving at differing results. Although the correlation method used in this investigation is more objective and the hole location uncertainties better defined, in order to have confidence in any results we will require drilling in areas where reflections are either more widely spaced or where we have better vertical velocity control in the hole.

(Table 2) Methane to ethane ratio, and d13C-methane at DSDP Hole 76-533

Natural gas hydrates are clathrates in which water molecules form a crystalline framework that includes and is stabilized by natural gas (mainly methane) at appropriate conditions of high pressures and low temperatures. The conditions for the formation of gas hydrates are met within continental margin sediments below water depths greater than about 500 m where the supply of methane is sufficient to stabilize the gas hydrate. Observations on DSDP Leg 11 suggested the presence of gas hydrates in sediments of the Blake Outer Ridge. Leg 76 coring and sampling confirms that, indeed, gas hydrates are present there. Geochemical evidence for gas hydrates in sediment of the Blake Outer Ridge includes (1) high concentrations of methane, (2) a sediment sample with thin, matlike layers of white crystals that released a volume of gas twenty times greater than its volume of pore fluid, (3) a molecular distribution of hydrocarbon gases that excluded hydrocarbons larger than isobutane, (4) results from pressure core barrel experiments, and (5) pore-fluid chemistry. The molecular composition of the hydrocarbons in these gas hydrates and the isotopic composition of the methane indicate that the gas is derived mainly from microbiological processes operating on the organic matter within the sediment. Although gas hydrates apparently are widespread on the Blake Outer Ridge, they probably are not of great economic significance as a potential, unconventional, energy resource or as an impermeable cap for trapping upwardly migrating gas at Site 533.