ES-409/ES-475

Petroleum Geology

Sedimentology, Sedimentary Rocks

and Sedimentary Basins
• The geology of petroleum is largely the
geology of sedimentary rocks and
sedimentary basins

• Commercial accumulation of petroleum are

found in sedimentary rocks occurring in
large sedimentary basin

• It is good to have a clear idea about

sedimentary rocks and sedimentary basins
• Sediments

• Sedimentary Rocks

• Sedimentology

• Sedimentary Basins
 Sediment

• Sediment is naturally occurring

material that is broken down by
processes of weathering and erosion,
and is subsequently transported by the
action of fluids such as wind, water, or
ice, and/or by the force of gravity
acting on the particle itself.
 Sediment
• Sediments are most often transported by water
(fluvial processes), wind (aeolian processes) and
glaciers

• Beach sands and river channel deposits are

examples of fluvial transport and deposition, though
sediment also often settles out of slow-moving or
standing water in lakes and oceans

• Desert sand dunes and loess are examples of

aeolian transport and deposition

• Glacial moraine deposits and till are ice-transported

sediments
 Sedimentary Rocks

• Sedimentary rocks are formed by the

accumulation and compaction of sediments
(particles)

• Also included are chemical precipitates from

a body of water

Sediments are generally loose material and

sedimentary rocks are lithified sediments,
lithification is the process of “turning into rocks”
 Sedimentology

Sedimentology is the study of the processes of

formation, transport and deposition of
material that accumulates as sediment in
continental and marine environments and
eventually forms sedimentary rocks
 Sedimentary Basin

• Sedimentary basins are areas in which

sediment accumulated at a significantly
greater rate than sediments of the same age
in neighbouring areas. So accumulating in
greater thickness.
A convenient division of sedimentary rocks
• Volcaniclastic sediments : Products of volcanic
eruptions or breakdown of volcanic rocks

• Terrigenous clastic : Particles or clasts derived from

pre-existing rocks. Clasts are principally detritus
eroded from bed rock and are commonly made up to
silicate minerals and are also termed as detrital
sediments and siliciclastic sediments

• Carbonates : Any sedimentary rock containing >50%

calcium carbnate (CaCo3)

• Evaporites : Deposits formed by precipitation of

salts out of water due to evaporation
 Udden-Wentworth
grain-size scale
Most widely used classification scheme
for aggregate particulate matter

The divisions on the scale are based on

factor of 2

It is a logarithmic (base 2) progression

It can be related to starting with a large

block and repeatedly breaking into two
pieces!

Four basic divisions : clay (<4μm),

silt (4-63 μm), sand (63 μm-2 mm)
and gravel (>2 mm)

Φ = - log2 (grain diameter in mm)

 Gravel and Conglomerate

• Gravel includes granules, pebbles, cobbles and

boulders

• Conglomerate: consolidated gravel

– granule conglomerate
– pebble conglomerate
– cobble conglomerate
– boulder conglomerate

• Rudite: synonymous with conglomerate

• Breccia : conglomerate made up of clasts that are

angular in shape
(sedimentary breccia is distinct from fault breccia)
 Gravel and Conglomerate
Types of conglomerate based on types of clasts

• Monomict conglomerate: if all the clasts are of same

material (all of granite for example)

• Polymict conglomerate: contains clasts of many

different lithologies

• Oligomict conglomerate: two or three clast types

present
 Texture of conglomerate
Based on proportion of gravel (clast) and matrix

• Sandy conglomerate: >20% sand-sized matrix

• Muddy conglomerate: >20% mud-sized matrix

• Clast-supported conglomerate: clasts touch each

other throughout the rock, syn: orthoconglomerate

• Matrix-supported conglomerate: clasts are completely

surrounded by matrix, syn: paraconglomerate

• Intraformational conglomerate: clasts and matrix

same material; formed due to reworking of lithified
sediments soon after deposition
 Conglomerate Matrix

Well-rounded pebble (clast)

 Sedimentary breccia

Angular clasts
 Clast-supported
conglomerate

Matrix-supported
conglomerate
 Sand and Sandstone
• Sand: 63 μm to 2 mm sized particles; fove
divisions - very fine, fine, medium, coarse
and very coarse

• Sandstone: it is a rock, i.e., lithified sand-

sized particles

• Sandstone is textural term

• Many sandstone contain mainly quartz but

there are sandstones which contain no
quartz at all
 Mineral grains in sand/sandstones

• Quartz : most common mineral in sand/sandstone,

resistant to chemical weathering

• Feldspars : susceptible to chemical weathering;

presence indicate less chemical weathering and/or
shorter transport

• Micas : commonly muscovite and biotite

• Heavy minerals : density >2.85 g cm3; zircon,

tourmaline, rutile, apatite, garnet etc, valuable for
provenance studies
 Other components of sands and sandstones

• Lithic framgments: rock fragments, example: beach

sands around volcanic islands

• Biogenic particles: broken shells of molluscs in

shallow marine environment; woods, seeds and
other parts of land plants

• Authigenic minerals: minerals that grow as crystals

in a depositional environment or during diagenesis;
example: glauconite

• Matrix: typically silt and clay-sized material

• Cement: chemical precipitate after deposition

Sandstone nomenclature and classification

• Informal nomenclature such as micaceous

sandstone, calcareous sandstone or
ferrugunous sandstone may be used to
indicate a particular mineralogical/chemical
composition and are useful in the field and
hands-specimen descriptions

• If a full petrographic analysis is available

with a thin section under microscope a more
formal nomenclature is used
 Triangular graph paper – QFL diagram

Quartz
Q-F-L classification
Pettijohn diagram
“Toblerone plot”

F
%L

%
25

Lit
art par

25
%F

h
s

ic f
%
% Feld
z

Qu

rag
%

a
Qu

me
rtz
50%Q

nts
A rock contains
Rock plots 50% Q, 25%F, 25% LF
here

Feldspar %Lithic fragments Lithic

%Feldspar fragments
Types of ternary diagrams
 Clay, Silt and Mudrock
• Volumetrically the most common of all sedimentary
rock types
• Usually studied using SEM or XRD techniques
• Mud and mudrock: mixtures of clay- and silt-sized
particles; unknown proportions
• Claystone: >2/3rd clay-sized particles
• Siltstone: >2/3rd silt-sized particles
• Mudstone: >1/3rd each of silt- and clay-sized partcles
• Shale: sometimes applied to any mudrock, but it is
best to use this term for mudrock that shows fissility
Classification of
terrigenous clastic
sediments
 Textures of terrigenous clasts
Sorting
• Sorting is a description of the distribution of
clast sizes present
• Well-sorted sediments are composed of
clasts that mainly fall in one class in
Wentworth scale
• Poorly-sorted sediments contain a wide
range of clast sizes
• With increased transport distance or
repeated agitation of a sediment, a sediment
tend to get better sorted
Sorting
 Textures of terrigenous clasts

• Clast roundness: Refers how much rounded

the edges of clasts; it is visually estimated
– During sediment transport the individual clasts
will repeatedly come into contact with each other
and with stationary objects
– Sharp edges are chipped off and abrasion
smoothens the surface of the clasts
– Roundness is a function of transport history

• Clast Sphericity
– The dimensions of individual clasts can be
considered in terms of closeness to a sphere
 Maturity of Terrigenous Sediments

• Maturity refers to the extent to which the

material has changed as compared to
starting material derived from bedrock

• Maturity can be measured in terms to texture

and composition

• Normally a compositionally mature sediment

is also texturally mature, but there are
exceptions
Textural maturity of sandstones
 Biogenic and Chemical Sediments
• In areas where there is not a large supply of
clastic detritus other processes are important in
the accumulation of sediments

• The hard parts of plants and animals ranging

from microscopic algae to vertebrate bones
make up deposits in many different
environments

• Of great significance are the many organisms

that build shells and structures of calcium
carbonate in life, and leave behind these hard
parts they die as calcareous sediments that
form limestone
 Limestone

• Some form in continental settings but vast

majority of limestones are the products of
processes in shallow marine environments,
where organisms play an important role in
creating the sediment that ultimately forms
limestone rock

• Calcium carbonate is the principal

compound in limestones

• Limestones, and sediments that become

limestones are called calcareous or
carbonates
 Carbonate mineralogy

• Calcite (CaCO3)

• Aragonite (CaCO3), denser than calcite

• Dolomite (CaMG(CO3)2); dolostone is a rock

containing dolomite; possibly diagenetic

• Siderite (FeCO3), early diagenetic product

 Carbonate forming animals

• Gastropods
• Cephalopods
– Belemnites
• Echinoids (sea urchins)
• Crinoids
• Foraminifera (planktonic and benthic)
• Corals
• Porifera (sponges)
A B

A. Bivalve molluscs on a beach

B. Bioclastic debris on a beach

C. Fossil gastropod shells in

limestone
C
Types of bioclasts
 Carbonate-forming plants

• Algae and microbial organisms are an important

source of biogenic carbonate and are important
contributors of fine-grained sediment in
carbonate environments
• Three types of algae are carbonate producers
– Red algae (rhodophyta) also known as coralline
algae, form encrustation on shell fragments/pebbles
– Green algae (chlorophyta) have calcified stems and
branches
– Yellow-green algae (chrysophyta, nanoplankton)
include coccoliths are spherical bodies a few tens of
microns across
• Cyanobacteria (microbial) occurs as algal
mats, domal and columnar forms
• They grow into stromatolites – earliest
lifeforms on Earth

Cyanobacteria forming Thin section of

modern stromatolites ancient stromatolites
 Non-biogenic constituents of limestones

• Ooid: concentrically layered spherical

bodies of calcium carbonate < 2 mm
diameter
• Pisoid: sub-spherical bodies of calcium
carnonate > 2 mm diameter
• Peloid: particles (<1 mm) of marine
organisms such as gastropods
• Intraclasts: are fragments of reworked
lithified calcium carbonate
• Aggregate grains: several fragments
cemented together; if collection of rounded
grains - grapestones
Dunham classification of carbonate
sedimentary rocks
 Types of sedimentary rocks

• Two main groups of sedimentary rocks on

the basis of their origin

– Clastic
• coarse-grained sandstones
• medium-grained sandstones
• fine-grained siltsones/mudstones/shales

– Chemical or biochemical
• limestones
• dolomite
• gypsum and halite
• Five types of sedimentary rocks important in
hydrocarbon production

– Sandstones (reservoir)
– Carbonates (limestones and dolomites) (reservoir
or source)
– Shales (source, cap)
– Evaporites (cap)