Abstract Indiana Limestone is one of the most used and versatile building stones in the USA. It is a uniform, carbonate grainstone formed during the Mississippian Subperiod of the Carbonifereous. The stone has excellent physical properties, good workability, fire resistance, durability, sustainability, reserves sufficient for hundreds of years, remarkable history, and is available in pleasing colours and textures. Indiana Limestone is used extensively for important buildings, homes, or carved as accents and sculptures, as well as other uses. At one time it was estimated that 60–80% of important US stone buildings were built with Indiana Limestone. This stone has been used for significant, even iconic buildings such as the Empire State Building and the Yankee Stadium, the Pentagon and many other government buildings, even religious structures such as the National Cathedral in Washington, DC, notable houses such as the Biltmore House in North Carolina, many Chicago landmarks, plus libraries, research centres, academic buildings and museums, across the USA. Sculptures throughout the USA and other countries are made of Indiana Limestone. The stone has good sustainability and is incorporated into the very culture of the state of Indiana and America. Indiana Limestone merits designation as a Global Heritage Stone Resource.

ABSTRACT Multiple orders of depositional cyclicity in the Mayes Group of northeastern Oklahoma are delineated by refined depositional facies associations and stratigraphic surfaces. Facies associations include deep subtidal facies, shallow subtidal facies (including distal and proximal subfacies), carbonate shoal facies, and shoal crest facies. The Mayes Group records a primary transgressive–regressive depositional cycle bounded below by a major unconformity (sub-Mayes unconformity) and above by an important provincial conodont biostratigraphic boundary and widespread flooding surface at the base of the Fayetteville Shale. Within the Mayes Group, two secondary transgressive–regressive depositional cycles are separated by an interpreted unconformity. The lower Mayes cycle comprises the Bayou Manard and Lindsey Bridge members of the Pryor Creek Formation, whereas the Ordnance Plant Member is grouped with the Hindsville Formation in the upper Mayes cycle. Present in both the lower and upper Mayes cycles are high-frequency shallowing-upward cycles bounded by flooding surfaces. Evaluating the distribution of facies and stratigraphic surfaces within a framework of multiple orders of depositional cyclicity is essential to interpreting the geologic evolution of the southern mid-continent during the Meramecian and Chesterian, and impacts oil and gas production by improving our understanding of reservoir compartmentalization.

ABSTRACT Four conodont biozones, including three subzones, are interpreted within a revised lithostratigraphic framework for the upper Boone Group and Mayes Group in northeastern Oklahoma and adjacent parts of Missouri, Kansas, and Arkansas. Although revised lithostratigraphy is principally based on observed lithologic characteristics and stratigraphic relationships, conodont biostratigraphic data played an important role in correlation and final organization of units. Within the upper Boone Group, Biozone 1 (lower Meramecian) includes the Ritchey Formation and the Tahlequah limestone and Biozone 2 (middle Meramecian) includes the Moccasin Bend Formation and Quapaw Limestone. The Mayes Group spans Biozone 3 and Biozone 4. Biozone 3 (upper Meramecian) is represented by the Bayou Manard Member of the Pryor Creek Formation (new name). Biozone 4 marks the appearance of definitive Chesterian conodont fauna. The lower two subzones within Biozone 4 correspond to the Lindsey Bridge (Biozone 4L) and Ordnance Plant (Biozone 4M) members of the Pryor Creek Formation, whereas the upper subzone consists of the Hindsville Formation (Biozone 4U). Documentation of conodont taxa and recognition of the proposed biozones provides relative time constraints for genetically meaningful interpretations of regional geology and subsequent evaluation of the Mayes Group and upper Boone Group within a broader interregional context.

ABSTRACT Facies analysis utilizing a conodont biostratigraphic framework is a powerful tool for evaluating genetic relationships of Osagean–basal Meramecian strata within the Ozark region (Arkansas–Missouri–Oklahoma) of the southern midcontinent. This investigation builds upon previous work cited herein, and suggests that some lithostratigraphic divisions, although useful in differentiating strata in a localized setting, may not be suitable for regional correlations within the Boone Group. High-resolution conodont biostratigraphy demonstrates the diachronous nature of lithostratigraphic divisions within the Boone Group, with both the Reeds Spring Formation and Bentonville Formation (Burlington–Keokuk) clearly becoming younger as they are traced from southwestern Missouri into northern Arkansas and northeastern Oklahoma. Subsequent facies analysis shows that the Reeds Spring Formation represents deposition within outer ramp through proximal middle ramp settings (low to moderate energy), whereas the Bentonville Formation (Burlington–Keokuk) records deposition within proximal middle ramp to inner ramp settings (moderate to high energy). Integration of facies analysis and conodont biostratigraphy-based relative chronostratigraphy provides the basis for construction of four time-slice maps illustrating the distribution of time-correlative facies belts. Together, these time-slice maps deliver a clearer representation of the evolution of Boone Group carbonate ramp deposition during the Osagean, which was characterized by overall shallowing-upward and progradation to south and southwest.

ABSTRACT The historic town of New Harmony is located along the Wabash River in Posey County, Indiana, and served as a focal point for natural scientists, especially geologists, in the early nineteenth century. Notable geologists that lived and worked in New Harmony during this time include Edward Travers Cox, William Maclure, Fielding Bradford Meek, Joseph Granville Norwood, David Dale Owen, Richard Dale Owen, Benjamin Franklin Shumard, Gerard Troost, and Amos Henry Worthen. Other natural scientists who worked in New Harmony include Charles Alexandre Lesueur and Thomas Say, and the town was also visited by James Hall, Leo Lesquereux, Sir Charles Lyell, and Alexander Philipp Maximilian, Prince of Wied. The purpose of this field-trip guide is to highlight the scientific and geologic enterprise that operated in nineteenth-century New Harmony, Indiana. There will be a tour of historic buildings including laboratories used by David Dale Owen, such as the Rapp-Owen Granary and his fourth laboratory, which was constructed in 1859. Furthermore, field-trip participants will visit a new geology exhibit at the Working Men’s Institute, an organization established by William Maclure in 1838. The field excursion will also visit historically significant localities, including Mississippian and Pennsylvanian exposures, the type section of the West Franklin Limestone, and a Pennsylvanian paleobotanical site that yielded extensive collections of plant fossils in the mid-nineteenth century. Finally, this field trip will provide an opportunity to discuss the importance of art to geological studies in the early nineteenth century. Specifically, hand-colored geologic maps, cross sections, and renderings of fossils were included with many of the scientific reports of historic New Harmony, and are reflected by the superb artwork of Charles Alexandre Lesueur, David Dale Owen, and Thomas Say. Access to view their original scientific artwork is possible only through special arrangement with the Working Men’s Institute.

ABSTRACT The Salem Limestone (Valmeyeran, Mississippian) is a preeminent dimensional limestone quarried in a two-county area of south-central Indiana for nearly 200 years. Advances in quarry technology in the past 30 years produce nearly smooth-sawn quarry walls that show the exquisite depositional details of the Salem carbonate shoal. The Salem shoal is part of a large-scale shoaling sequence that produced a carbonate platform during the middle Mississippian that began at the end of Borden Group (Mississippian) delta deposition and culminated with the deposition of the Ste. Genevieve Limestone (Mississippian). The Salem was deposited as a high-energy, but subtidal shoal above fair-weather wave base. Four environments are recognizable within the shoal: active shoal, open lagoon, intrashoal channel, and intershoal channel. A shoal crest environment may also be present as a fifth environment. A hierarchy of bounding surfaces can be defined using the sawed quarry exposures. First-order surfaces are foreset laminae and appear as inclined or horizontal stratification. Second-order surfaces are the contacts between similar bedforms, and third-order surfaces truncate first- and second-order surfaces, representing breaks in sedimentation. Combined they define mesoforms within the shoal complex. Fourth-order surfaces, similar to third-order surfaces, represent a change from a shoal to lagoonal setting. Evidence of hard-ground development occurs along third-order surfaces, associated with encrusting bryozoan holdfasts, corals, and columnar subtidal stromatolites. Tracing surfaces on the quarry walls is vital to reconstructing the internal architecture of the shoal and the processes that operated within it. We will examine this shoal architecture by visiting quarries and an outcrop, and we will visit a mill where quarried stone blocks are fabricated into panels and shapes for buildings.

ABSTRACT This walking trip examines local and imported stones used for a wide variety of monuments, museums, skyscrapers, and other structures in downtown Indianapolis. These include Christ Church Cathedral, the Indiana War Memorial, the Indiana Statehouse, the Indiana State Museum, the Eiteljorg Museum of American Indian Art, and an assortment of skyscrapers and other buildings of interest because of the local and imported stones used in their construction. Special attention is given to the spectacular use of stone for the Indiana War Memorial, which is patterned after the tomb of Mausoleus. The origin, composition, weathering, and in some cases replacement of stone used for these varied structures built over a span of a century-and-a-half is discussed. Attention is also given to the use of faux stone, use of stone versus glass, weathering and cleaning of stone, bowing of marble, and biocolonization of building stone.

Abstract The use of crude oil-bearing strata as geological sinks for sequestration of carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) includes a value-added component for recovering new oil from existing oil fields that have undergone primary and/or waterflood production. Carbon dioxide has been used in enhanced oil recovery (EOR) for more than two decades in the Permian Basin of west Texas. This CO 2 experience suggests that following water flooding with CO 2 flooding produces an additional 10% of original oil in place (OOIP) or an additional 25% beyond total oil produced during the primary and water flooding phases. The Midwest Geological Sequestration Consortium has studied the CO 2 EOR potential of the Illinois Basin in Illinois, Indiana, and Kentucky. Oil has been produced from this basin for more than a century, to date yielding a cumulative production of 4.3 billion of an estimated 14.1 billion bbl of OOIP. The consortium’s study focuses on three topics regarding the potential of CO 2 flooding in Illinois Basin fields. The first is evaluation of oil recovery potential employing geological, geostatistical, and reservoir models built for specific geological settings. The second is estimation of total hydrocarbon available to CO 2 flooding, requiring an updated estimate of the basinwide OOIP. The third is calculation of the total volume of carbon that could be sequestered by such programs and the volume of additional hydrocarbon recovery that might reasonably be expected. Using west Texas experience as a guideline, reservoir modeling results suggest that 0.86–1.3 billion bbl of oil may be recoverable from the Illinois Basin using CO 2 EOR. Along with this incremental oil recovery, an estimated 154,000–485,000 tons of CO 2 can be sequestered simultaneously.

Abstract Deeply buried reservoir strata in the Illinois Basin may be targeted for carbon sequestration, but only if discontinuities that may affect the reservoir and its overlying sealing strata can reliably be detected and mapped in three dimensions. Detection and mapping of subtle discontinuities (e.g., faults) are critical factors in assessing a potential carbon sequestration reservoir because such structures may affect the integrity of the reservoir seal or affect the connectivity within the reservoir itself. In this study, we apply and assess various techniques to enhance the interpretation of the deep structure of a small oil field in the Illinois Basin called the Tonti field. Techniques used include three-dimensional (3-D) spectral decomposition and semblance, combined with other seismic attributes, to demonstrate the crucial need for broad bandwidth data and continuity-based seismic attributes when dealing with the very subtle structural discontinuities that characterize the Illinois Basin. The coincident application of enhancement techniques to both two-dimensional (2-D) and 3-D seismic data from the same geological feature emphasizes the value of tracing discontinuities within 3-D seismic attribute volumes as opposed to using single profiles or even a network of profiles. The results show that 3-D seismic analysis can identify discontinuities at or near the sealing horizon (base of the Cambrian–Ordovician Knox Group at or near the top of the Cambrian Mt. Simon Sandstone), whereas on conventional 2-D seismic profiles, these discontinuities are at best subtle and difficult or impossible to interpret. From the 3-D seismic data for the Tonti field, these discontinuities appear to be associated with the folding of overlying strata, although a nontectonic origin cannot be ruled out. In general, this type of analysis can focus the attention on potential problem areas for sequestration; however, the seismic data analysis alone cannot determine if reflector discontinuities necessarily imply potential leakage but can decrease the uncertainty in evaluation.