The nature and origin of sideritic ironstone bands in the Tertiary Lowmead and Duaringa Basins, Queensland

Abstract

Sideritic ironstones in Tertiary lacustrine oil shale from the Lowmead and Duaringa Basins in Queensland, contain two distinctive types of siderite in the ironstone bands: sphaerosiderite in the mudstone and coal, and finely crystalline siderite in the lamosite. The petrological evidence indicates that the siderite in the ironstone bands formed eogenetically by growing displacively within the soft sediment. Chemically the siderite is very pure though the sphaerosiderite sometimes shows compositional zoning. Stable oxygen and carbon isotope analyses of the siderite show a wide range of values from ‐12.8‰ to ‐2.4 %0 δ18O (PDB) and ‐5.5‰ to +12.9‰ δ13C (PDB) for the Lowmead Basin; and ‐9.6‰ to ‐1.2‰ δ18O (PDB) and ‐18.6‰ to +16.4‰ δ13C (PDB) for the Duaringa Basin. The oxygen isotope data indicate that the siderite formed in freshwater environments but not in isotopic equilibrium with the formation waters. Kinetic factors offer the most plausible explanation for the anomalously light δ18O values of many of t...