Great American Carbonate Bank: The Geology and Economic Resources of the Cambrian—Ordovician Sauk Megasequence of Laurentia

The Great American Carbonate Bank (GACB) comprises the carbonates (and related siliciclastics) of the Sauk megasequence, which were deposited on and around the Laurentian continent during Cambrian through earliest Middle Ordovician, forming one of the largest carbonate-dominated platforms of the Phanerozoic. The Sauk megasequence, which ranges upwards of several thousand meters thick along the Bank's margin, consists of distinctive Lithofacies and fauna that are widely recognized throughout Laurentia. A refined biostratigraphic zonation forms the chronostratigraphic framework for correlating disparate outcrops and subsurface data, providing the basis for interpreting depositional patterns and the evolution of the Bank. GACB hydrocarbon fields have produced 4 BBO and 21 TCFG, mostly from reservoirs near the Sauk-Tippecanoe unconformity. The GACB is also a source of economic minerals and construction material and, locally, serves as either an aquifer or repository for injection of waste material. This Memoir comprises works on biostratigraphy, ichnology, stratigraphy, depositional facies, diagenesis, and petroleum and mineral resources of the GACB. It is dedicated to James Lee Wilson who first conceived of this publication and who worked on many aspects of the GACB during his long and illustrious career.
Development of the Lower Cambrian–Middle Ordovician Carbonate Platform: North Atlantic Region
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Published:January 01, 2012
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CiteCitation
Svend Stouge, David A. T. Harper, William D. Boyce, Ian Knight, Jørgen L. Christiansen, 2012. "Development of the Lower Cambrian–Middle Ordovician Carbonate Platform: North Atlantic Region", Great American Carbonate Bank: The Geology and Economic Resources of the Cambrian—Ordovician Sauk Megasequence of Laurentia, James Derby, Richard Fritz, Susan Longacre, William Morgan, Charles Sternbach
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Abstract
The northeastern margin of Laurentia formed an important part of the Iapetus Ocean and includes the development of the Franklinian Basin in North Greenland and Arctic Canada. The uninterrupted continental margin bordering the North American craton is represented by well-exposed successions in Northeast and eastern North Greenland, together with Svalbard and Bjørnøya. Physiographically, the northeastern margin of Laurentia during the early Paleozoic history of Greenland was a northward extension of the passive rifted continental margin of the Caledonian continental edge of Laurentia. It was a transform-rifted margin and represents the part of the Laurentian margin that borders the Arctic...