Re: Declining water and oil

On Thu, 20 Nov 2003 05:56:14 -0600 "Glenn Morton"
<glennmorton@entouch.net> writes:

> I spoke loosely. The fact is that coccoliths extract CaCO3 from the
ocean
> and deposit it in their skeletons, which then fall to the ocean floor
to
> create chalk.

Minor point, but I thought CaCO3 is a precipitate. Do the coccolith
critters extract Ca, CO2 and O2 from solution or take up the undissolved
precipitate particles? Or can CaCO3 go into solution without being
dissociated?

> Thus, if there isn't enough CaCO3 in the oceans to account for
> all the limestone, it clearly can't be the result of a one year flood.

Ummm, you're extrapolating current conditions backward. Carbonatites are
basically igneous carbonates; we could have had a volcanic source of
carbonates and iron, which would provide the materials for planktonic
blooms to produce widespread chalks, also explain the massive,
non-fossiliferous limestones we see in north Alabama.

On 11/15/03 you said on this thread: "The Clinton is an iron-rich oolite,
clearly marine. The iron may have been a local source off of the old
Taconian Mtns." When I was in school (late 60's) I seem to remember that
there was no explanation for the origin of the iron ore in the Clinton,
or what we in AL call the Red Mountain formation. As you know, the
Clinton goes from AL to NY, and contains "billions" of tons of ore. My
old text (Longwell, Flint and Sanders, Phyiscal Geology, 1969, p 586)
says: "It is believed that the iron was dissolved from iron-bearing
minerals in mafic igneous rocks, carried by streams to the shallow sea
(perhaps as a bicarbonate), and there precipitated as oxides." Is there
a modern analog for this type of iron deposit, or is this another case
where things in the past were different?

> Yes we can. You just don't like the explanation. To almost everyone
else,
> the explanation fits coherently and cogently.

Glenn, my friend. "He who girdith his sword up should not boast like he
who girdith it down." :-) I take it that you're ready to go one on one.

> And that is what Austin says caused the coalseams to
> form--vegetation falling from beneath the floating mat and forming.

...and forming peat which later became coalified? Yes, that is what
Autin says, and based upon the data I must agree with him.

> "Dr. Steven Austin wrote his doctoral dissertation at Penn State
University
> on a new model for coal formation based on his study of a coal field in
> Kentucky. While geologists have used a peat swamp model to explain coal
> formation for over 100 years, Austin argued that explanation doesn't
fit
> because coal is coarsely textured like bark, not finely textured like
swamp
> peat. Swamp peat contains root material; coal does not. Swamp peat
rests on
> a layer of soil; coal often rests on a rock layer. No swamp peat has
been
> found partly formed into coal."

I think that paragraph is a bit oversimplified. Austin of course didn't
originate the idea that coal formed from transported rather than in situ
peat, he merely applied the idea to the data he collected from the
Kentucky No. 12 coal. A more descriptive term than "coarsely textured"
would be banded - the bands come mainly from horizontal sheets of bark
interbedded with other material to produce a banded appearance in cross
section. Coal does contain some root material, but not to the same
extent as peat. Coal usually has a sharp contact with the substrate,
which may be clay, shale, or occasionally sandstone or even limestone.

> Thus there shouldn't be any difference between the deep and shallow
water
> coal. All you can point to in the deep water is the occasional log
that
> floated out the sea, got waterlogged and sank to be compressed to a
particle
> of coal. That isn't at all what Austin's view is.

First of all, deep-ocean water, per our previous conversation, usually
contains currents which would disperse a rain of peat over a wide area.
Secondly, you're not dealing with the data at hand; you're resorting to
something you believe should happen way out in the ocean rather than
attempting to explain, for instance, the banded structure characteristic
of eastern US coals, which should have been destroyed by bioturbation
from the roots if the banded coals were swamp deposits.

> And if you want to see roots underneath a coal bed see
>
http://home.entouch.net/dmd/ROOTSquintettemineTumblerRidgeCanadaCret2tw.j
pg
>
> These coals didn't float in the ocean.

Ah, now we're getting somewhere. That's an interesting photo, although
not typical of the coals with which I'm most familiar. I would like to
go into detail on that photo; I'll respond on another post.

Bill

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Received on Mon Nov 24 22:34:53 2003