Modeling shallow marine carbonate depositional systems

  • Authors:
  • Jon Hill;Daniel Tetzlaff;Andrew Curtis;Rachel Wood

  • Affiliations:
  • School of GeoSciences, The University of Edinburgh, Grant Institute, West Mains Road, Edinburgh EH9 3JW, United Kingdom;Schlumberger Information Solutions, 5599 San Felipe Avenue, suite 1700, Houston TX 77056, USA;School of GeoSciences, The University of Edinburgh, Grant Institute, West Mains Road, Edinburgh EH9 3JW, United Kingdom and Edinburgh Collaborative of Subsurface Science and Engineering (ECOSSE), ...;School of GeoSciences, The University of Edinburgh, Grant Institute, West Mains Road, Edinburgh EH9 3JW, United Kingdom and Edinburgh Collaborative of Subsurface Science and Engineering (ECOSSE), ...

  • Venue:
  • Computers & Geosciences
  • Year:
  • 2009

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Abstract

Geological Process Models (GPMs) have been used in the past to simulate the distinctive stratigraphies formed in carbonate sediments, and to explore the interaction of controls that produce heterogeneity. Previous GPMs have only indirectly included the supersaturation of calcium carbonate in seawater, a key physicochemical control on carbonate production in reef and lagoon environments, by modifying production rates based on the distance from open marine sources. We here use the residence time of water in the lagoon and reef areas as a proxy for the supersaturation state of carbonate in a new process model, Carbonate GPM. Residence times in the model are calculated using a particle-tracking algorithm. Carbonate production is also controlled by water depth and wave power dissipation. Once deposited, sediment can be eroded, transported and re-deposited via both advective and diffusive processes. We show that using residence time as a control on production might explain the formation of non-ordered, three-dimensional carbonate stratigraphies by lateral shifts in the locus of carbonate deposition on timescales comparable to so-called 5th-order sea-level oscillations. We also show that representing supersaturation as a function of distance from open marine sources, as in previous models, cannot correctly predict the supersaturation distribution over a lagoon due to the intricacies of the flow regime.