Spatial influence of fault-related stress perturbations in northern Switzerland

The spatial influence of faults on the crustal stress field is a topic of ongoing debate. While faults are often known to perturb the stress field at a meter scale, their lateral influence over a few hundred meters to several kilometers remains poorly understood. To address this knowledge gap, we use a 3D geomechanical numerical model based on 3D seismic data from northern Switzerland. The model is calibrated with 45 horizontal stress magnitude data obtained from micro-hydraulic fracturing (MHF) and sleeve re-opening (SR) tests conducted in two boreholes in the Zürich Nordost (ZNO) siting region, northern Switzerland. This model with seven faults implemented as contact surfaces serves as the reference model in our study. The reference model is systematically compared to three fault-agnostic models, which share identical rock properties, model dimensions, and calibration data with the reference model, but differ in their element resolution and mechanical properties' assignment procedure. Results show that at distances