In the post-Paleozoic rocks on Svalbard (Spitsbergen, Edgeoya, and Barentsoya), primary mineral compositions, together with depositional environment and stratigraphic relations, have been major factors in establishing mature diagenesis. Close to the surface the carbonate cement of the rocks has been altered to iron oxide with a resulting increase in porosity. Insitu P-wave velocity measurements with deeper wave paths into unaltered rocks give a picture of the diagenesis of these rocks.

The high velocities and the low porosities present throughout Svalbard do not agree with earlier assumptions of decreasing consolidation eastward in the Mesozoic-Tertiary Spitsbergen basin.

A velocity inversion is present on Bjornoya, in the western Barents Sea, where Permian carbonates with velocities of 5.4 to 5.6 km/sec and low porosities rest on Carboniferous and Devonian sedimentary rocks with lower velocities and higher porosities.