Frontier formation stratigraphy on the Moxa Arch, Green River Basin, Wyoming
- Bureau of Economic Geology, Austin, TX (United States)
Frontier Formation terrigenous clastics record early Late Cretaceous shoreline progradation and cyclic marine and nonmarine sedimentation in a foreland basin. In this study well-log correlations and studies of core were used to establish the stratigraphic framework of the Frontier along the Moxa Arch, a north-trending intrabasin structure in the western Green River Basin. Regional marine flooding surfaces and surfaces of erosion were traced along the Moxa Arch, which is subparallel to Frontier depositional strike, and from the north end of the Moxa Arch eastward to the Rock Springs Uplift. Nonmarine facies composed of fluvial channel-fill sandstone and interchannel mudstone form lowstand depositional systems tracts overlying subaerial erosion surfaces, whereas marine shoreface sandstones in progradational parasequence sets form highstand depositional systems tracts. Lowstand system tracts are separated from overlying highstand systems tracts by maximum flooding surfaces. Transgressive systems tracts composted of retrogradational parasequence sets are generally thin or missing. By tracing systems tracts from the Moxa Arch westward to outcrops in the Thrust Belt, correlations were made between subsurface and outcrop members of the Frontier Formation. Outcrop chronostratigraphy was then used to compare local sequence development to a global sea-level record. On the Moxa Arch, variations in both depositional thickness and erosional truncation along strike indicate that tectonically controlled subsidence and sediment input were important controls on sequence development and masked the influence of most reported third-order eustatic sea-level fluctuations. More accurate reservoir characterization and attribute prediction are possible within this stratigraphic framework.
- OSTI ID:
- 518391
- Journal Information:
- Mountain Geologist, Vol. 33, Issue 2; Other Information: PBD: Apr 1996
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
Similar Records
Paleocene-eocene lignite beds of southwest Alabama: Parasequence beds in highstand systems tracts
Sequence stratigraphic analysis of stratigraphic oil traps in the west Siberian Neocomian