Uranium ore rolls in Westwater Canyon sandstone, San Juan Basin, New Mexico
Recent relatively deep uranium-exploration drilling in the Nose Rock area, San Juan Basin, McKinley County, New Mexico, has resulted in the discovery of previously unrecognized uranium ore rolls in gray, unoxidized Westwater Canyon Sandstone of the Morrison Formation. Both the Nose Rock ores and the primary Ambrosia Lake uranium ores were emplaced during the Late Jurassic-Early Cretaceous erosional interval under the same geologic conditions by the same geochemical-cell process. The red, altered interior ground resulting from the geochemical-cell process has been re-reduced by the subsequent entry of reductants into the formation. The original roll form of the Ambrosia Lake orebodies has been obscured and modified by redistribution related to the present-day active redox interface interweaving with the Ambrosia Lake ores.
- Research Organization:
- Phillips Uranium Corp., Albuquerque, NM
- OSTI ID:
- 6188346
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-7905120-; TRN: 81-017875
- Journal Information:
- Mem. - N.M. Bur. Mines Miner. Resour.; (United States), Vol. 38; Conference: New Mexico Bureau of Mines and Mineral Resources conference, Albuquerque, NM, USA, 13 May 1979
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
Similar Records
Geology and recognition of a relict uranium deposit in Sec. 28, T. 14 N. , R. 10 W. , Southwest Ambrosia Lake Area, McKinley County
Summary of the geology and resources of uranium in the San Juan Basin and adjacent region, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, and Colorado