Regional stress and structure in relation to brown coal open cuts of the Latrobe Valley,Victoria

An interpretation of the origins of folds and joints, which affect the Tertiary Brown Coal Measures of the Latrobe Valley, leads to the proposal that the geological structures have been formed under a regional Late Tertiary NNW‐SSE compressive stress. Considerations of the pattern of measured in situ stresses and of interpreted stresses, derived from earth movements around open cuts and from earthquakes, indicate that a regional NNW‐SSE compressive stress is still in existence in the SE part of Australia at the present time.

It is proposed that the consistencies in the stress orientations reflect consistencies in the Late Tertiary to Recent global movements of the Australian plate.