Koen Van Noten

Royal Observatory of Belgium · Seismology-Gravimetry (OD2)

The Grote Brogel Fault (GBF) is a major WNW-ESE striking normal fault in Belgium that diverges westward from the NW-SE striking western border fault system of the Roer Valley Graben. The GBF delimits the topographically higher Campine Block from the subsiding Roer Valley Graben, and is expressed in the Digital Terrain Model (DTM) by relief gradient...

Human activity causes vibrations that propagate into the ground as high-frequency seismic waves. Measures to mitigate the COVID-19 pandemic caused widespread changes in human activity, leading to a months-long reduction in seismic noise of up to 50%. The 2020 seismic noise quiet period is the longest and most prominent global anthropogenic seismic...

We present a comprehensive study of the 23 February 1828 earthquake that caused severe damage in the central part of the present Belgian territory. We synthesised and critically reassessed the information provided by contemporaneous scientific studies and newspapers of the Low Countries. In addition, a systematic survey of official, private, and re...

The empirical power law relation (PR) between resonance frequency (f0), obtained from H/V spectral ratio analysis of ambient noise, and sediment thickness (h), obtained from boreholes, is frequently used in microzonation studies to predict bedrock depth. In this study, we demonstrate (i) how to optimally construct a PR by including the error on the...

Below several public buildings in Brussels (Belgium), one aims to transform the main heating source away from hydrocarbons towards shallow geothermal energy. The GeoCamb project investigates the geothermal potential of the Brabant Massif bedrock below Brussels. For each potential project, however, prospecting drilling and hydrogeological surveys co...

The resurgence of macroseismic data investigations over the last decades has highlighted its importance and versatility in the broader field of seismology. Macroseismic data in Belgium are plenty thanks to systematic and thorough macroseismic surveys, starting from the beginning of the 20 th century. Collection and processing procedures, however, h...

With more than 120 years of continuous seismic recordings, Belgium is among the oldest seismological entities in Europe and the World. Currently, we are renewing several permanent sensors and opening their data stream to the community. Alongside, we perform a site-characterization study for all these stations. The main objective is to provide the m...

The use of Nodal systems based on autonomous geophone-based instruments entered the field of Seismology only recently. These lightweight solutions revolutionized seismological fieldwork through lightweight and wholistic instruments that are faster to deploy and easier to handle. The IGU-16HR series of SmartSolo® is one example, but yet lacking a th...

The present study analyses the impact and damage of shallow seismic activity that occurred from the end of the 19th century until the late 20th century in the coal area of the Hainaut province in Belgium. This seismicity is the second-largest source of seismic hazard in north-western Europe after the Lower Rhine Embayment. During this period, five...

Shallow, light to moderate magnitude earthquakes in stable continental regions can have a damaging impact on vulnerable surface constructions. In the coal area of the Hainaut province in Belgium, a century of shallow seismic activity occurred from the end of the 19th century until the late 20th century. This seismicity is the second largest source...

The influence of strain distribution inheritance within fault systems on repeated fault reactivation is far less understood than the process of repeated fault reactivation itself. By evaluating cross sections through a new 3D geological model, we demonstrate contrasts in strain distribution between different fault segments of the same fault system...

The city of Auckland, New Zealand (Tāmaki Makaurau, Aotearoa), sits on top of an active volcanic field. Seismic stations in and around the city monitor activity of the Auckland Volcanic Field (AVF) and provide data to image its subsurface. The seismic sensors – some positioned at the surface and others in boreholes – are generally noisier during th...

The city of Auckland, New Zealand (Tamaki Makaurau, Aotearoa) sits on top of an active volcanic field. Seismic stations in and around the city monitor activity of the Auckland Volcanic Field (AVF), and provide data to image its subsurface. The seismic sensors – some positioned at the surface and others in boreholes – are generally noisier during th...

Since the 14 th century, moderate seismic activity with 14 earthquakes of magnitude Mw≥5.0 occurred in Western Europe in a region extending from the Lower Rhine Graben (LRG) to the southern North Sea. In this paper, we investigate how well this seismic activity could reflect that of the future. The observed earthquake activity in the LRG is continu...

Abstract. After their first development in the middle Mesozoic, the overall NW-SE striking border fault systems of the Roer Valley Graben were reactivated as reverse faults under Late Cretaceous compression (inversion) and reactivated again as normal faults under Cenozoic extension. In Flanders (northern Belgium), a new geological model was created...

Tectonic structures that developed prior to folding, such as pre- and early-kinematic veins, hold valuable information on the stress state of the paleobasin in which these early structures formed. To derive the parental orientation of these prefolding brittle structures, folds need to “unfold.” A fold restoration methodology is presented in which f...

Tectonic structures that developed prior to folding, such as pre- and early-kinematic veins, hold valuable information on the stress state of the paleobasin in which these early structures formed. To derive the parental orientation of these prefolding brittle structures, folds need to be ‘unfold’. In this chapter a fold restoration methodology is p...

The practice of macroseismic investigation through internet inquiries is well established among numerous seismological institutions around the world, thanks to wide citizen participation. Although internet macroseismic data analysis has reached high levels in Europe, intensity methods adopted by each one of the national research institutes are stil...

Travertine geobodies have been identified as potential reservoir analogues to carbonate build-ups in pre-salt hydrocarbon systems. To investigate travertine geobody deformation, faults were mapped in 35 travertine quarries that excavate the Ballık travertine, i.e. a c. 12.5 km2 large travertine geobody that precipitated at the intersection of the N...

Thermal conductivity (TC) [W/m.K] is a quantitative sediment/rock property that determines where and how much heat flows through a rock/reservoir. The knowledge of TC anisotropy of laminated and pelitic rock is however rather poor and forms the subject of this study. We developed a methodology beyond the state-of-the-art to measure, investigate and...

Societies rely on a secure, responsible and affordable supply of resources to meet their basic needs, in order to live life in a safe and healthy environment. The natural resources from the subsurface, i.e. groundwater, geo-energy and raw materials, represent essential elements in this provision. Safety from catastrophic events, such as those linke...

At the end of 2016, the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences (RBINS), acquired two µCT scanners, through a budget of the Belgian Science Policy (BELSPO) to digitize its precious collection. The two µCT scanners, a RX Solutions EasyTom 150 (http://www.rxsolutions.fr/) and a XRE UniTOM (https://xre.be/), with a resolution of 4µm and maximal po...

The practice of macroseismic investigation through internet inquiries is well established among several geophysical institutions around the world, thanks to wide citizen participation. Up to now each institution follows its own method and procedure in collecting, analyzing and showing felt earthquake data in the form of maps, graphs and intensity d...

Calculating thickness variations of soft sediments above bedrock is important for site effect characterisation, earthquake ground motion amplification and for hydrogeological and geothermal purposes. In case seismic array instru-mentation is not available and hence shear-wave velocity profiles cannot be obtained, other correlation techniques need t...

How do seismologists detect earthquakes? How do we locate them? Is seismology only about earthquakes? Seismology has been integrated into a wide variety of geo-disciplines to be complementary to many fields such as tectonics, geology, geodynamics, volcanology, hydrology, glaciology and planetology. In this short course, dedicated to non-seismologi...

Several areas of science have been assigned a UN-recognised day for the field (e.g., World Meteorological Day, World Tsunami Awareness Day, World Oceans Day); however, such a day is presently lacking for seismology. In preparation for a “Seismology Day”, we would like to gauge the degree of support within the seismology community and increase momen...

The online collection of earthquake reports in Europe is strongly fragmented across numerous seismological agencies. In this contribution we demonstrate how merging online institutional macroseismic data can improve the density of observations and the quality of intensity shaking maps. Instead of using ZIP code maps, we geocode individual response...

The collection of macroseismic data using questionnaires has a long tradition in Europe. At least 34 seismological institutes in 24 countries have installed their own version of an online macroseismic - Did you feel the earthquake? - inquiry. Unfortunately, several countries do not show the results of the submitted responses in real-time online. He...

Since 2014, the Seismology Division (SM) of the European Geosciences Union (EGU) has its Early Career Scientist (ECS) representative to reach out to its numerous ‘younger’ members. In April 2016, a new team of representatives joined the Division. We are a vivid team of early career scientists, representing both (either) PhD students and post-doctor...

The online collection of earthquake reports in Europe is strongly fragmented across numerous seismological agencies. This paper demonstrates how collecting and merging online institutional macroseismic data strongly improves the density of observations and the quality of intensity shaking maps. Instead of using ZIP code Community Internet Intensity...

In the US, the USGS is the only institute that gathers macroseismic data through its online “Did You Feel It?” (DYFI) system allowing a homogeneous and consistent intensity assessment. In Europe, however, we face a much more complicated situation. As almost every nation has its own inquiry in their national language(s) and both the EMSC and the USG...

The online collection of earthquake testimonies in Europe is strongly fragmented across numerous seismological agencies. This paper demonstrates how collecting and merging “Did You Feel It?” (DYFI) institutional macroseismic data strongly improves the quality of real-time intensity maps. Instead of using ZIP code Community Internet Intensity Maps w...

In this interview I propose another approach for mapping earthquake impact: Instead of using classic communal maps, in which intensities derived from Did You Feel It? responses of felt earthquakes are averaged per municipality, we first geocode individual response addresses for location improvement, second, calculate the mean intensity of all answe...

If you could fly around your research results in three dimensions, wouldn’t you like to do it? Combining the capabilities of an open-source drawing tool with Google Earth maps allows researchers to visualize real-world cross-sectional data in three dimensions. Any spatial model displaying research results can be exported to a vertical figure to ena...

Since 1938, when an earthquake occurs, the Royal Observatory of Belgium (ROB) sends out national earthquake inquiries to each municipality to create intensity maps of the felt area. Since 2002, only few hours after the ML 4.9 Alsdorf earthquake, the paper inquiry was complemented by an online “Did You Feel It?” (DYFI?) inquiry on the seismology.be...

Ballık traverten kütlesi dünyadaki en geniş Pleyistosen traverten çökelim alanlarından birisidir. Ballık travertenleri, GB Türkiye’nin en büyük genişleme havzalarından biri olan KB-GD gidişli Denizli Horst-Graben Sistemi’nin (DHGS) doğu bölümündeki havza kenar fayları boyunca gelişmiştir. Travertenler yükselen kenarda varolan fay-kırık ağı boyunca...

The region of Court-Saint-Etienne, a community at about 20 km SE of Brussels in Walloon Brabant, has experienced a seismic sequence from 12 July 2008 to 18 January 2010. This seismic sequence is characterised by several periods of swarm activity, of which the largest swarm activity took place in the summer of 2008 and spring 2009, alternating with...

The Denizli Basin in the West Anatolian Extensional Province in western Turkey is well-known for its numerous travertine occurrences. A combined sedimentological, diagenetical and geochemical investigation is executed on the Ece and Faber travertines of the Ballık area, the largest travertine site in the Denizli Basin. The first aim of this study i...

Structural interpretations of the tectonic grain of orogenic mountain belts have often been based on the study of potential field data. The steep architecture of mountain belts can be highlighted by the inclination of the magnetic field and by the persistence of aeromagnetic lineaments with depth. With respect to seismology, matched filtering has p...

The Ballık travertine mass is the largest Pleistocene travertine precipitation site in the world. It developed along the basin margin faults of the eastern part of the NW-SE oriented Denizli Graben-Horst System (DGHS), one of the large extensional basins in SW Turkey. Travertine formed from hot basinal carbonate-precipitating fluids that resurfaced...

The Ballık travertine mass is the largest Pleistocene travertine precipitation site in the world. It developed along the basin margin faults of the eastern part of the NW-SE oriented Denizli Graben-Horst System (DGHS), one of the large extensional basins that characterise the West Anatolian Extensional Province in SW Turkey. Recent structural analy...

Through the use of three different geophysical techniques, we highlight structures and groundwater storage changes in the subsurface of a karst system, in the so-called epikarst layer. An Electrical Resistivity Tomography (ERT) has been installed onsite informing on conductivity variations directly related to changes in groundwater content within t...

Between 2008 and 2010, the Royal Observatory of Belgium received numerous ‘Did You Feel It’-reports related to a 2-year lasting earthquake swarm at Court-Saint-Etienne, a small town in a hilly area 20 km SE of Brussels, Belgium. These small-magnitude events (-0.7 ≤ ML ≤ 3.2, n = c. 300 events) were recorded both by the permanent seismometer network...

Between July 2008 and January 2010 a seismic swarm took place in a region 20 km south of Brussels, Belgium. The sequence started on the 12th of July 2008 with a M L = 2.2 event and was followed the day after by the largest event in the sequence (M L = 3.2). Thanks to a locally installed temporary seismic monitoring system more than 300 low magnitud...

Compressional tectonic inversions are classically represented in 2D brittle failure mode (BFM) plots that illustrate the change in differential stress (s1 2s3) versus the pore-fluid pressure during orogenic shortening. In these BFM plots, the tectonic switch between extension and compression occurs at a differential stress state of zero. However, m...

AbstractIn the frontal part of the Rhenohercynian fold-and-thrust belt (High-Ardenne slate belt, Germany), two successive types of quartz veins, oriented normal and parallel to bedding respectively, are interpreted to reflect the early Variscan compressional tectonic inversion of the Ardenne-Eifel sedimentary basin. Fracturing and sealing occurred...

PhD Thesis Katholieke Universiteit Leuven https://lirias.kuleuven.be/handle/123456789/306163

Most of the courses in the bachelor and master of geology at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (Belgium) has one or more one-day field trips, each with their particular disciplinary focus. Field trips commonly serve to illustrate subject matter treated during lectures; others aim at training field skills. The students experience each field trip –...

A detailed structural mapping and geometrical analysis of distinct bedding-(sub)perpendicular and beddingparallel quartz veins has been performed in the northeastern part of the High-Ardenne slate belt (Rursee, North Eifel, Germany), with the aim to reconstruct the local fracturing/veining history. The structural relationship of these two types of...