Tasmanite is a sedimentary rock type almost entirely consisting of the prasinophyte alga Tasmanites. It is commonly associated with high-latitude, nutrient-rich, marginal marine settings find in Tasmania. [1] It is classified as marine type oil shale. [2] It is found in many oil-prone source rocks and, when present, contributes to the oil generation potential of the rock. Some sources also produce a red-brown translucent material similar to amber which has also been called tasmanite.
Oil shale is an organic-rich fine-grained sedimentary rock containing kerogen from which liquid hydrocarbons can be produced. In addition to kerogen, general composition of oil shales constitutes inorganic substance and bitumens. Based on their deposition environment, oil shales are classified as marine, lacustrine and terrestrial oil shales. Oil shales differ from oil-bearing shales, shale deposits that contain petroleum that is sometimes produced from drilled wells. Examples of oil-bearing shales are the Bakken Formation, Pierre Shale, Niobrara Formation, and Eagle Ford Formation. Accordingly, shale oil produced from oil shale should not be confused with tight oil, which is also frequently called shale oil.
Petroleum geology is the study of origin, occurrence, movement, accumulation, and exploration of hydrocarbon fuels. It refers to the specific set of geological disciplines that are applied to the search for hydrocarbons.
Kerogen is solid, insoluble organic matter in sedimentary rocks. Comprising an estimated 1016 tons of carbon, it is the most abundant source of organic compounds on earth, exceeding the total organic content of living matter 10,000-fold. It is insoluble in normal organic solvents and it does not have a specific chemical formula. Upon heating, kerogen converts in part to liquid and gaseous hydrocarbons. Petroleum and natural gas form from kerogen. Kerogen may be classified by its origin: lacustrine (e.g., algal), marine (e.g., planktonic), and terrestrial (e.g., pollen and spores). The name "kerogen" was introduced by the Scottish organic chemist Alexander Crum Brown in 1906, derived from the Greek for "wax birth" (Greek: κηρός "wax" and -gen, γένεση "birth").
Vitrinite is one of the primary components of coals and most sedimentary kerogens. Vitrinite is a type of maceral, where "macerals" are organic components of coal analogous to the "minerals" of rocks. Vitrinite has a shiny appearance resembling glass (vitreous). It is derived from the cell-wall material or woody tissue of the plants from which coal was formed. Chemically, it is composed of polymers, cellulose and lignin.
Albertite is a variety of asphalt found in the Albert Formation in Albert County, New Brunswick, and in a deposit at Dingwall, in the north-east of Scotland. It is a type of solid hydrocarbon.
Organic-rich sedimentary rocks are a specific type of sedimentary rock that contains significant amounts (>3%) of organic carbon. The most common types include coal, lignite, oil shale, or black shale. The organic material may be disseminated throughout the rock giving it a uniform dark color, and/or it may be present as discrete occurrences of tar, bitumen, asphalt, petroleum, coal or carbonaceous material. Organic-rich sedimentary rocks may act as source rocks which generate hydrocarbons that accumulate in other sedimentary "reservoir" rocks. Potential source rocks are any type of sedimentary rock that the ability to dispel available carbon from within it. Good reservoir rocks are any sedimentary rock that has high pore-space availability. This allows the hydrocarbons to accumulate within the rock and be stored for long periods of time. Highly permeable reservoir rocks are also of interest to industry professionals, as they allow for the easy extraction of the hydrocarbons within. The hydrocarbon reservoir system is not complete however without a "cap rock". Cap rocks are rock units which have very low porosity and permeability, which trap the hydrocarbons within the units below as they try to migrate upwards.
Cannel coal or candle coal is a type of bituminous coal, also classified as terrestrial type oil shale. Due to its physical morphology and low mineral content cannel coal is considered to be coal but by its texture and composition of the organic matter it is considered to be oil shale. Although historically the term cannel coal has been used interchangeably with boghead coal, a more recent classification system restricts cannel coal to terrestrial origin, and boghead coal to lacustrine environments.
The Perth Basin is a thick, elongated sedimentary basin in Western Australia. It lies beneath the Swan Coastal Plain west of the Darling Scarp, representing the western limit of the much older Yilgarn Craton, and extends further west offshore. Cities and towns including Perth, Busselton, Bunbury, Mandurah and Geraldton are built over the Perth Basin.
Torbanite, also known as boghead coal or cannel coal, is a variety of fine-grained black oil shale. It usually occurs as lenticular masses, often associated with deposits of Permian coals. Torbanite is classified as lacustrine type oil shale.
Oil shale geology is a branch of geologic sciences which studies the formation and composition of oil shales–fine-grained sedimentary rocks containing significant amounts of kerogen, and belonging to the group of sapropel fuels. Oil shale formation takes place in a number of depositional settings and has considerable compositional variation. Oil shales can be classified by their composition or by their depositional environment. Much of the organic matter in oil shales is of algal origin, but may also include remains of vascular land plants. Three major type of organic matter (macerals) in oil shale are telalginite, lamalginite, and bituminite. Some oil shale deposits also contain metals which include vanadium, zinc, copper, and uranium.
The history of the oil shale industry started in ancient times. The modern industrial use of oil shale for oil extraction dates to the mid-19th century and started growing just before World War I because of the mass production of automobiles and trucks and the supposed shortage of gasoline for transportation needs. Between the World Wars oil shale projects were begun in several countries.
Kukersite is a light-brown marine type oil shale of Ordovician age. It is found in the Baltic Oil Shale Basin in Estonia and North-West Russia. It is of the lowest Upper Ordovician formation, formed some 460 million years ago. It was named after the German name of the Kukruse Manor in the north-east of Estonia by the Russian paleobotanist Mikhail Zalessky in 1917. Some minor kukersite resources occur in sedimentary basins of Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin, North Dakota, and Oklahoma in North America and in the Amadeus and Canning basins of Australia.
In petroleum geology, source rock is rock which has generated hydrocarbons or which could generate hydrocarbons. Source rocks are one of the necessary elements of a working petroleum system. They are organic-rich sediments that may have been deposited in a variety of environments including deep water marine, lacustrine and deltaic. Oil shale can be regarded as an organic-rich but immature source rock from which little or no oil has been generated and expelled. Subsurface source rock mapping methodologies make it possible to identify likely zones of petroleum occurrence in sedimentary basins as well as shale gas plays.
Marinite is a gray to dark-gray or black oil shale of marine origin in which the chief organic components are lamalginite and bituminite derived from marine phytoplankton, with varied admixtures of bitumen, telalginite and vitrinite. Marinite deposits are the most abundant oil-shale deposits. They are generally widespread but at the same time they are relatively thin and often of restricted economic importance. Typical environments for marinite deposits are found in epeiric seas.
The Illinois Basin is a Paleozoic depositional and structural basin in the United States, centered in and underlying most of the state of Illinois, and extending into southwestern Indiana and western Kentucky. The basin is elongate, extending approximately 400 miles (640 km) northwest-southeast, and 200 miles (320 km) southwest-northeast.
Safaniya Oil Field, operated and owned by Saudi Aramco, is the largest offshore oil field in the world. It is located about 265 kilometres (165 mi) north of the company headquarters in Dhahran on the coast of the Persian Gulf, Saudi Arabia. Measuring 50 by 15 kilometres, the field has a producing capability of more than 1.2 million barrels per day.
Pyrobitumen is a type of solid, amorphous organic matter. Pyrobitumen is mostly insoluble in carbon disulfide and other organic solvents as a result of molecular cross-linking, which renders previously soluble organic matter insoluble. Not all solid bitumens are pyrobitumens, in that some solid bitumens are soluble in common organic solvents, including CS
2, dichloromethane, and benzene-methanol mixtures.
The Halibut Field is an oil field, within the Gippsland Basin offshore of the Australian state of Victoria. The oil field is located approximately 64 km offshore of southeastern Australia. The total area of this field is 26.9 km2 and is composed of 10 mappable units.
Bituminite is an autochthonous maceral that is a part of the liptinite group in lignite, that occurs in petroleum source rocks originating from organic matter such as algae which has undergone alteration or degradation from natural processes such as burial. It occurs as fine-grained groundmass, laminae or elongated structures that appear as veinlets within horizontal sections of lignite and bituminous coals, and also occurs in sedimentary rocks. Its occurrence in sedimentary rocks is typically found surrounding alginite, and parallel along bedding planes. Bituminite is not considered to be bitumen because its properties are different from most bitumens. It is described to have no definite shape or form when present in bedding and can be identified using different kinds of visible and fluorescent lights. There are three types of bituminite: type I, type II and type III, of which type I is the most common. The presence of bituminite in oil shales, other oil source rocks and some coals plays an important factor when determining potential petroleum-source rocks.
The Greater Green River Basin (GGRB) is a 21,000 square mile basin located in Southwestern Wyoming. The Basin was formed during the Cretaceous period sourced by underlying Permian and Cretaceous deposits. The GGRB is host to many anticlines created during the Laramide Orogeny trapping many of its hydrocarbon resources. It is bounded by the Rawlins Uplift, Uinta Mountains, Sevier overthrust belt, Sierra Madre Mountains, and the Wind River Mountain Range. The Greater Green River Basin is subdivided into four smaller basins, the Green River Basin, Great Divide Basin, Washakie Basin, and Sand Wash Basin. Each of these possesses hydrocarbons that have been economically exploited. There are 303 named fields throughout the basin, the majority of which produce natural gas; the largest of these gas fields is the Jonah Field.
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