nature of the recent vertical ground movements inferred from high precision leveling data in an intraplate setting ne ardenne belgium yearly high precision leveling surveys have been performed from 1993 to 1998 along a 48 km long local network centered on gileppe lake at the foot of the ardenne massif belgium institut geographique militaire and institut geographique national igm ign levelings of 1948 and 1974 yielded additional information the data were corrected for collimation and thermal errors other sources of error earth tides atmospheric refraction rod miscalibration were estimated and corrections were made when necessary random errors of individual surveys range from 0 15 to 0 74 mm km the recorded elevation changes indicate the existence of tilted segments some 5 to 10 km in length with yearly tilt values amounting up to 2 rads fault movements of a few mm yr are also demonstrated the segment limits are spatially stable from one year to the next but very frequent sense reversals of the vertical motions are observed this explains why the total movement over a 20 to 30 year period is barely higher than the yearly displacements various nontectonic causes of vertical ground movement e g monument instability varying water loading of the lake sediment compaction etc have been considered yielding little satisfactory explanation of the patterns of observed elevation changes we propose that the recorded motions which we call reversible fault creep and reversible tilt respectively are a true tectonic signal reflecting the tectonic noise which accompanies the long term deformation of uplifting areas in intraplate settings such movements are characteristic of fault segments which may occasionally generate earthquakes

variations in pore characteristics in high volatile bituminous coals implications for coal bed gas content abstract the seelyville coal member of the linton formation pennsylvanian in indiana was studied to 1 understand variations in pore characteristics within a coal seam at a single location and compare these variations with changes occurring between the same coal at different locations 2 elaborate on the influence of mineral matter and maceral composition on mesopore and micropore characteristics and 3 discuss implications of these variations for coal bed gas content the coal is high volatile bituminous rank with r 0 ranging from 0 57 to 0 60 bet specific surface areas determined by nitrogen adsorption of the coals samples studied range from 1 8 to 22 9 m 2 g bjh adsorption mesopore volumes from 0 0041 to 0 0339 cm 3 g and micropore volumes determined by carbon dioxide adsorption from 0 0315 to 0 0540 cm 3 g the coals that had the largest specific surface areas and largest mesopore volumes occur at the shallowest depths whereas the smallest values for these two parameters occur in the deepest coals micropore volumes in contrast are not depth dependent in the coal samples examined for this study mineral matter content influenced both specific surface area as well as mesopore and micropore volumes it is especially clear in the case of micropores where an increase in mineral matter content parallels the decrease of micropore volume of the coal no obvious relationships were observed between the total vitrinite content and pore characteristics but after splitting vitrinite into individual macerals we see that collotelinite influences both meso and micropore volume positively whereas collodetrinite contributes to the reduction of mesopore and micropore volumes there are large variations in gas content within a single coal at a single location because of this variability the entire thickness of the coal must be desorbed in order to determine gas content reliably and to accurately calculate the level of gas saturation

localization of the gravity field and the signature of glacial rebound the negative free air gravity anomaly centred on hudson bay canada shows a remarkable correlation with the location of the laurentide ice sheet suggesting that this gravity anomaly is the result of incomplete post glacial rebound this region however is also underlain by higher than average mantle seismic velocities suggesting that the gravity low might result instead from dynamic topography associated with convective downwellings here we analyse the global gravity field as a simultaneous function of geographic location and spectral content we find that the hudson bay gravity low is unique with anomalously high amplitude in the spectral band where the power from the laurentide ice load is greatest and the relaxation times predicted for viable models of viscous relaxation are longest we estimate that about half of the hudson bay gravity anomaly is the result of incomplete post glacial rebound and derive a mantle viscosity model that explains both this gravity signature and the characteristic uplift rates for the central laurentide and fennoscandian regions this model has a jump in viscosity at 670 km depth comparable to that in dynamic models of the geoid highs over subducted slabs but lacks a low viscosity asthenosphere consistent with a higher viscosity in the upper mantle beneath shields than in oceanic regions

a revised relaxation time spectrum for fennoscandia summary the fennoscandian relaxation time spectrum rts first derived by mcconnell 1968 is a classic data set in studies of glacial isostatic adjustment gia we outline a new method for estimating an rts from a set of strandline data which is based on a damped least squares solution for spherical harmonic coefficients associated with the strandline heights in contrast to the hankel transform approach outlined by mcconnell 1968 the method does not require interpolation or extrapolation of the data nor does it use the assumption that peripheral deformations are zero we begin by applying the new approach to a suite of synthetic strandlines these synthetic calculations quantify the effect on the rts estimates of the common assumptions of free decay uplift an axisymmetric fennoscandian deformation field and the uncertainty introduced by limited spatial and temporal sampling of this field recently the accuracy of the sauramo 1958 strandline data upon which the mcconnell 1968 rts was based has been questioned wolf 1996 accordingly we apply our new approach to a set of more robust strandline data published by donner 1964 1969 1980 1995 to compute a revised rts for fennoscandia at high harmonic degrees above 50 our new rts is characterized by weak constraints whereas mcconnell s 1968 rts suggests a significant reduction in relaxation times relative to the values at low degrees this reduction was the basis for mcconnell s 1968 inference of an elastic lithosphere in contrast to this we conclude that the trend is an artefact of the observational data set he adopted at lower degrees mcconnell s 1968 relaxation time estimates lie at the lower end of the range implied by the present analysis to complete our study we apply the techniques of linearized bayesian inference to invert our newly derived rts for mantle viscosity we find that the rts provides an estimate of 5 1020 pa s for the volumetric mean viscosity in a region extending from the base of the lithosphere to about 550 km depth target regions which extend from the transition zone to 1200 km depth are less well constrained however the average viscosity from the base of the lithosphere to 1200 km depth is consistent with the classic haskell 1935 value of 1021 pa s for mantle viscosity finally we demonstrate that viscosity models within the class inferred by mitrovica forte 1997 from joint inversions of postglacial relaxation times associated with gia and mantle convection observables simultaneously fit the revised fennoscandian rts

a complete formalism for the inversion of post glacial rebound data resolving power analysis summary a formal inverse theory for mantle viscosity based upon the data of glacial isostatic adjustment is here formulated and applied to synthetic data in this theory full account has been taken of the normal mode nature of the forward problem for realistic viscoelastic maxwell models of the planet since it is impossible to accurately infer the excitation and decay constants of the individual normal modes from the observations the formalism is cast in terms of the observed gross earth data in the time domain in this analysis expressions are required for the first order perturbations in both the modal amplitudes and relaxation times that are induced by an arbitrary radial perturbation to the starting viscosity profile a numerical technique is developed which enables us to accurately determine differential kernels for the modal amplitudes the analogous kernels for the modal decay times are derived analytically peltier 1976 and the complete set of kernels is shown to satisfy the physical constraint imposed by the uniqueness of the state of isostatic equilibrium for the viscously incompressible maxwell models that we employ when the problem is parametrized in terms of the logarithm of viscosity the kernels are capable of accurately predicting shifts in the normal mode characteristics for at least an order of magnitude variation in mantle viscosity using bayesian statistics a formal inversion is applied to a set of synthetically generated data these data chosen to reproduce the space time coverage of the actual observables include a subset related to the global gravity field and a large sequence of idealized relative sea level rsl curves it is found that even very weak a priori constraints can provide a stable and accurate inversion a resolving power analysis indicates a spatial resolution of approximately 1200km near the core mantle boundary cmb with a gradual improvement to better than 350km in the middle of the upper mantle subsets of the synthetic data are inverted in order to examine conditions on stability and accuracy and to determine their relative contributions to the spatial resolution data from progressively older beaches are shown to contribute most to the spatial resolution at all depths though the improvement in lower mantle resolution converges for data obtained from beaches formed within the last 5000 yr furthermore the rsl curves in the vicinity of the peripheral bulge of the ancient laurentide ice sheet are significant contributors to lower mantle resolution as demonstrated in previous analyses of the forward problem the inversion of this subset of the data also appears to be encouragingly stable

attenuation tomography of the earth s mantle a review of current status resolving the lateral variations of attenuation in the deep mantle by tomographic methods holds potential for constraining its thermal structure and dynamics it is a challenging subject which has been addressed by only a few studies until now we here review the main motivations behind pursuing this challenge the difficult issues involved in separating effects of anelastic attenuation from scattering and focusing due to propagation in 3 d elastic structure and finally discuss the current status of global attenuation tomography

haskell 1935 revisited the haskell 1935 value of 1021 pa s for mantle viscosity is a classic and enduring constraint on the rheology of the earth s interior we revisit this inference using spherically symmetric self gravitating maxwell viscoelastic earth models our inference is based on both forward and inverse analyses of decay times associated with uplift at two sites considered by haskell angerman river sweden and oslo norway rather than the raw relative sea level rsl data at these sites we demonstrate that predictions of the decay time associated with the angerman river data are insensitive to variations in both the late pleistocene ice load history and the lithospheric thickness of the earth model the predictions at oslo are sensitive to both these inputs and hence decay times at this site provide a remarkably robust constraint on mantle viscosity we derive a constraint on the average viscosity of the mantle of 0 65 1 10 1021 pa s where the average resolved by the data encompasses a region which extends from the base of the lithosphere to a depth of near 1400 km this indicates that many previous analyses which have invoked the haskell value of 1021 pa s as a constraint on the average upper mantle i e above 670 km depth viscosity alone have misinterpreted the resolving power of the inference furthermore our analysis indicates that a number of apparently contradictory inferences of viscosity based on fennoscandian data satisfy the new rigorous interpretation of the haskell constraint finally we demonstrate how the ambiguity in the upper mantle lower mantle viscosity contrast associated with the haskell average may be reduced by invoking decay time constraints estimated from rsl curves in hudson bay a preliminary inversion of decay times at angerman river and richmond gulf in hudson bay suggests a contrast of approximately an order of magnitude between the average viscosities of the upper mantle and the top 1000 km of the lower mantle however a conclusive analysis in this regard must await the determination of consistent decay time estimates for the hudson bay region

oxygen isotopes and sea level from the time that detailed oxygen isotope records derived from foraminifera living in the constant temperature environment of the abyssal ocean became available there has been a discrepancy between the ice volume record that these records imply and that derived from the altitude of dated coral terraces around the world here we re examine the data and conclude that the temperature of the abyssal ocean has been an actively varying component of the climate system

mantle dynamics postglacial rebound and the radial viscosity profile abstract we infer the radial viscosity structure of the earth s mantle from observations of long wavelength geoid glacially induced sea level changes and changes in the earth s rotation and gravitational field we employ a combination of forward and formal inverse modeling of long term mantle circulation driven by large scale density differences deduced from seismic tomography based on the resulting unscaled mantle viscosity profiles we model the time dependent glacial isostatic adjustment of the earth related to past and present changes in the ice ocean mass imbalance and we deduce scaled mantle viscosity profiles which simultaneously fit the long wavelength geoid constraint and glacially induced changes of the earth s shape three mantle viscosity profiles are fitting the observational data equally well all profiles are characterized by a two order of magnitude variation of viscosity within the earth s mantle variations of viscosity in the upper mantle are less than one order of magnitude in the lower mantle the viscosity differs significantly with depth for all models average viscosities in the upper and lower mantle are around 2 5 1020 and 1 3 1022 pa s respectively

the melting history of the late pleistocene antarctic ice sheet spatial and temporal variations in the sea levels of the past 20 000 years around the globe place constraints on the melting history of the major late pleistocene ice sheets the antarctic ice sheets provided a significant contribution to the sea level rise at a rate that was approximately synchronous with the melting of the laurentide ice sheet except for the interval 9 000 6 000 years ago when it may have lagged behind minor melting of the antarctic ice sheet continued throughout the holocene

origin and accumulation of petroleum in deep precambrian reservoir in baxian sag bohai bay basin china abstract the baxian sag is a mature exploration area the exploitation of deep sedimentary formation is becoming increasingly important as the further development potential of shallow plays faces growing challenges the discovery of the niudong gas condensate field from deep precambrian reservoirs indicates that potentially significant hydrocarbon resources remain to be discovered in deeper stratigraphic units this study was undertaken to better understand the generation and accumulation of hydrocarbons in deep reservoirs through integrated petroleum geochemistry fluid inclusion analysis and source rock analysis geochemical parameters of condensate and gas suggest that condensate and gas in precambrian reservoir have similar thermal maturity and are directly derived from gas prone source rock at high maturity levels the regional structure section and hydrocarbon distribution indicate that gas condensate in the nd1 well is more likely derived from lacustrine source rock in the paleogene shahejie formation refined source kitchen analysis indicates that lacustrine source rocks in the shahejie formation display a high degree of heterogeneity including organo facies c d e and f differences in the nature and composition of the expelled petroleum exist between organo facies due to variations in kerogen composition the orderly spatial distributions of gas oil ratio gor api gravity and gas carbon isotopes denote that the various fronts expelled hydrocarbons at different maturity levels from different organo facies this reflects the dynamic scenario of petroleum migration and accumulation from kitchen to shallow reservoirs the precambrian reservoir in nd1 well has experienced multiple charging with hydrocarbon expulsion at different maturity levels while hydrocarbons of lower maturity have arrived into the shallower reservoirs condensate and gas expelled at high maturation levels have efficiently accumulated in deeper prospects

glacial isostatic adjustment i the forward problem summary the isostatic adjustment of a radially stratified visco elastic spheroid is treated using space time green functions for the associated surface mass load boundary value problem these impulse response functions are convolved with a heaviside function to give the time dependent deformation of the planet which would be produced by a unit point mass brought up from infinity at t 0 and allowed to remain on the surface the resulting heaviside green functions can be employed to simulate all of the important signatures of glacial isostatic adjustment given a space time dependent surface mass load consisting of ice sheet ablation histories and a model of the simultaneous filling of the ocean basins these source terms are simply convolved with the heaviside green function appropriate to a specific response signature a realistic model of the spatial distribution of the main late pleistocene ice loads and of their temporal disintegration is constructed the response of two visco elastic earth models is computed and compared to a global set of relaxation data relative sea level curves on the basis of this initial comparison of theory and observation the possibility that the lower mantle has a viscosity which is significantly in excess of the viscosity of the upper mantle is excluded in addition clear evidence of the presence of the lithosphere has been found in relaxation data from sites which were near the edge of the laurentide ice sheet such data should therefore prove useful as a basis for analysis of lateral variations in lithosphere thickness further extensions of the calculation are suggested

global geodetic signatures of the antarctic ice sheet four scenarios of present day antarctic ice sheet mass change are developed from comprehensive reviews of the available glaciological and oceanographic evidence the gridded scenarios predict widely varying contributions to secular sea level change ranging from 1 1 to 0 45 mm yr and predict polar motion and time varying low degree gravitational coefficients that differ significantly from earlier estimates a reasonably linear relationship between the rate of sea level change from antarctica a and the predicted antarctic is found for the four scenarios this linearity permits a series of forward models to be constructed that incorporate the effects of ice mass changes in antarctica greenland and distributed smaller glaciers as well as postglacial rebound assuming the ice 3g deglaciation history with the goal of obtaining optimum reconciliation between observed constraints on and sea level rise numerous viable combinations of lower mantle viscosity and hydrologie sources are found that satisfy observed in the range of 1 to 2 2 5 mm yr and observed for degrees 2 3 and 4 in contrast rates of global sea level rise above 2 5 mm yr are inconsistent with available observations the successful composite models feature a pair of lower mantle viscosity solutions arising from the sensitivity of to glacial rebound the paired values are well separated at mm yr but move closer together as is increased and in fact merge around 2 2 5 mm yr revealing an intimate relation between and preferred lower mantle viscosity this general pattern is quite robust and persists for different solutions for variations in source assumptions and for different styles of lower mantle viscosity stratification tighter constraints for l 2 may allow some viscosity stratification schemes and source assumptions to be excluded in the future for a given total observed the sea level rise from antarctica a is tightly constrained and ranges from 0 to 1 mm yr corresponding to an ablating ice sheet as estimates of are raised from 1 to 2 5 mm yr however when the degree 3 zonal harmonic constraint is removed the solutions show little sensitivity to antarctic mass balance emphasizing the need for a well determined odd degree secular zonal harmonic for determining polar ice mass balance

radial profile of mantle viscosity results from the joint inversion of convection and postglacial rebound observables we present new inferences of the radial profile of mantle viscosity that simultaneously fit long wavelength free air gravity harmonics associated with mantle convection and a large set of decay times estimated from the postglacial uplift of sites within previously glaciated regions hudson bay arctic canada and fennoscandia the relative sea level variation at these latter sites is constrained by age height pairs obtained by geological survey rather than the subjective trends which are commonly used in glacial isostatic adjustment gia studies our viscosity inferences are generated using two approaches first we adopt a relative viscosity profile which is known to provide a good fit to the free air gravity harmonics and determine an absolute scaling which yields a best fit to the gia decay time constraints second we perform an iterative nonlinear joint inversion of the two data sets in both cases our inferred profiles are characterized by a significant increase of viscosity 2 orders of magnitude with depth to values of 1022 pa s in the bottom half of the lower mantle the new viscosity profiles are shown to satisfy constraints based on the postglacial uplift of both fennoscandia the classic haskell 1935 number and hudson bay which have commonly been invoked to argue for an isoviscous mantle furthermore the models are used to predict a set of long wavelength signatures of the gia process these include predictions of gia induced variations in 1 the length of day over the late holocene period 2 the earth s precession constant and obliquity over the last 2 6 myr and 3 the present day zonal harmonics of the geopotential jl l 7 the predictions 1 and 3 bound the late holocene and ongoing mass flux between the large polar ice sheets greenland and antarctic and the global oceans to small values 0 4 mm yr equivalent eustatic sea level rise

mineral matter in coals cleat minerals and their origin in some coals from the english midlands abstract in four coal seam profiles from the cannock coalfield west midlands the cleat joint frequency is a function of lithotype greatest in vitarin and is inversely related to bed thickness the cleat minerals were studied 1 under the microscope optical and electron 2 by x ray diffraction and 3 chemically the minerals present are pyrite marcasite sphalerite galena sulphides quartz kaolinite silicates ankerite calcite carbonates and apatite this sequence has features in common with diagenetic sequences recorded in other rock types and it is concluded that the cleat minerals in coal form in response to pore fluid evolution and movement during burial diagenesis the elements are thought to originate from both the coal and the associated sediments mainly mudrocks similarities in diagenetic sequences are in part a reflection of the importance of organic maturation reactions in all the rock types in the sequence whereas differences are attributed to the dominance of these reactions in the coal itself

glaciation induced perturbations in the earth s rotation a new appraisal we revisit the theory and predictions of glaciation induced perturbations in both the rotation rate of the earth or j 2 and the wander of the rotation pole with respect to the surface geography the two most common theoretical formulations associated with polar wander driven by the surface loading of a viscoelastic earth e g sabadini et al 1982 wu and peltier 1984 appear to disagree by one on the number of rotational normal modes associated with a surface gravitational response having n normal modes we show using a generalized theory that the two formalisms yield essentially equivalent predictions we next consider a benchmark comparison of recent predictions of present day polar wander speed due to glacial isostatic adjustment henceforth gia these comparisons confirm the validity of certain previous analyses e g spada et al 1992a they also reveal that predictions of polar wander speed can be sensitive to an assumption of incompressibility previous studies have noted that predictions of j 2 rotation rate as a function of lower mantle viscosity differ significantly in form from analogous predictions of polar wander speed we investigate these differences by considering the contribution to the predicted anomalies from the individual normal modes of relaxation we find that the normal mode structure of the j 2 rotation rate predictions is fundamentally different from that which characterizes the polar wander response and this difference reflects the distinct physical mechanisms which govern these anomalies finally using a large suite of forward computations as well as the calculation of a set of frechet kernels we investigate the sensitivity of our predictions to variations in the viscoelastic earth model we find for example that a previously noted sensitivity of polar wander speed predictions to variations in lithospheric thickness is only valid for earth models with relatively weak lower mantle viscosities 5 x 10 21 pa s

tests of glacial rebound models for fennoscandinavia based on instrumented sea and lake level records summary evidence for changing sea levels in northwestern europe related to glacial rebound is found in both the geological record of the past millennia and in the instrumental records of the past two centuries the latter records are of two types records of sealevel change primarily from the baltic and the gulfs of finland and bothnia and records of the tilting of some of the larger lakes in both finland and sweden the sealevel records are particularly important because of their long duration and high quality their large number and good spatial distribution and the spatially coherent background noise the two instrumental data types are complementary and provide constraints on the upper mantle rheology and on the distribution of ice during the late glacial stage comparisons of the observed rates of change of the water levels with models for glacial rebound yield earth models with a lithospheric thickness of 80 100 km and an uppermantle viscosity of 4 5 1020 pa s evective parameters that are consistent with those obtained from the analysis of the geological evidence for the same region the mareograph results support ice sheet models in which the late weichselian ice thickness over the eastern and southern parts of fennoscandia is relatively thinner than that for the western region also consistent with the interpretation of the geological evidence for sea level change in addition the instrumental records provide constraints on the eustatic sea level change for about the past 100 years a satisfactory separation of the earth rheology parameters from this rate of change can be achieved by estimating the latter only from those records for which the predicted isostatic evects are small a check on these results is possible by using the lake level records to establish constraints on the earth model parameters and the sea level records to constrain also the eustatic change all approaches lead to an average eustatic sea level rise for the past century of about 1 1 0 2 mm yr 1

recent postglacial rebound gravity change and mantle flow in fennoscandia summary the recent postglacial rebound of fennoscandia is investigated using sea level data levelling data and gravity data in particular an analysis is made of the repeated data obtained hitherto on the fennoscandian land uplift gravity line along latitude 63 methods for this analysis include an iterative procedure for computing the relation between gravity change and absolute land uplift the mass flow parameter and the geoid rise the remaining land uplift is also estimated the mass flow parameter c is used to characterize the relation between additional mass and additional volume due to rebound it is a number between 0 and 1 1 corresponding to full inflow of mantle below the rising crust and 0 to no inflow but some kind of decompression the main result is that c is significantly different from 0 at the 99 per cent level we find c 0 8 this means that models proposed of the present uplift based on pure decompression must be ruled out and that a viscous inflow of mantle is a necessary part of the ongoing uplift process on the other hand this process might be more complicated than a pure viscous flow

coal petrology and coal seam gas contents of the walloon subgroup surat basin queensland australia abstract core exploration and appraisal drilling over the last four years have targeted the juandah upper and taroom lower coal measures of the middle jurassic walloon subgroup of the injune creek group these wells have shown that the high volatile bituminous perhydrous coals of the walloon subgroup have gas contents of between 1 and 14 m 3 t and some wells have encountered gas flows at rates of over 30 000 m 3 day this recent work has confirmed the initial supposition that the coals within the walloon subgroup contain sufficient quantities of gas to be economically viable as a coal seam gas source coal volumes depth and structure have also been confirmed from the initial work what has become apparent during this work is the variability in gas content across each of the seams in the juandah and taroom coal measures and the variability in coal petrographic composition of these two units are controlled by many factors what has also become apparent is that the taroom coal measures have a lower average gas content than the overlying juandah coal measures the obvious conclusion is that the difference in gas content is related to a difference in coal petrology not only do the gas contents of these coal intervals differ their gas adsorption capacities also differ with the taroom coal measures coals displaying on average lower gas content and lower gas adsorption capabilities again the obvious cause would be coal petrological differences but the juandah and taroom coal measures coals have similar maceral percentages an understanding of the relationship between gas desorption gas adsorption and coal composition is vital in determining which areas in the basin offers the most economically viable targets for the commercialisation of coal seam gas in the surat basin

sea level change glacial rebound and mantle viscosity fornorthern europe northwestern europe remains a key region for testing models of glacial isostasy because of the good geological record of crustal response to the glacial unloading since the time of the last glacial maximum models for this rebound and associated sea level change require a detailed knowledge of the ice sheet geometry including the ice thickness through time existing ice sheet reconstructions are strongly model dependent and inversions of sea level data for the mantle response may be a function of the model assumptions thus inverse solutions for the sea level data are sought that include both ice and earth model parameters as unknowns sea level data from fennoscandia the north sea the british isles and the atlantic and english channel coasts have been evaluated and incorporated into the solutions the starting ice sheet for fennoscandia is based on a reconstruction of a model by denton hughes 1981 that is characterized by quasi parabolic cross sections and symmetry about the load centre both global northwestern europe as a whole and regional subsets of the data solutions have been made for earth model parameters and ice height scaling parameters the key results are as follows 1 the response of the upper mantle to the changing ice and water loads is spatially relatively homogenous across scandinavia the north sea and the british isles 2 this response can be adequately modelled by an effective elastic lithosphere of thickness 65 85 km and by an effective upper mantle viscosity from the base of the lithosphere to the 670 km depth seismic discontinuity of about 3 4 1020 pa s the effective lower mantle viscosity is at least an order of magnitude greater 3 the ice thickness over scandinavia at the time of maximum glaciation was only about 2000 m much less than the 3400 m assumed in the denton hughes model 4 the ice profiles are asymmetric about the centre of the ice sheet with those over the western part being consistent with quasi parabolic functions whereas the ice heights over the eastern and southern regions increase much more slowly with distance inwards from the ice margin

a global geoid model with imposed plate velocities and partial layering most inversions of the long wavelength geoid in conjunction with the seismic tomographic information have so far been carried out under the assumption of either purely whole mantle or perfectly layered circulation moreover modeling the lithosphere as a spherical shell with a uniform low viscosity was found to yield the best fit to the observed geoid we have tested whether a good prediction of the geoid can also be achieved by including two constraints a semipermeable behavior of the 660 km discontinuity and surface plate velocities equal to the observed ones the mass transfer between upper and lower mantle has been changed by imposing a surface density anomaly at a depth of 660 km which is proportional to the mass anomaly needed to achieve perfectly layered circulation on the top of the mantle we assume a stiff lithosphere that moves with a velocity corresponding to the observed plate motion the viscosity only varies with depth considering a simple three layer viscosity structure and changing the permeability of the 660 km interface we have obtained a satisfactory variance reduction of the geoid data 75 for degrees 2 12 the best fit to the geoid is obtained if the mass transfer across the 660 km boundary is reduced to one third in comparison with the purely whole mantle model the best fitting viscosity profile is characterized by a clearly defined asthenosphere and a viscosity increase by at least 2 orders of magnitude in the lower mantle the amplitudes of dynamic topography predicted by our model are remarkably small 100 m thus fully compatible with the observation

hydrogeologic factors affecting gas content distribution in coal beds gas content in coal is not fixed but changes when equilibrium conditions within the reservoir are disrupted therefore gas content distribution in coal varies laterally within individual coal beds vertically among coal beds in a single well and within thicker coal beds major hydrogeologic factors affecting gas content variability include gas generation coal properties and reservoir conditions gas generation affects gas content variability on a regional scale whereas coal properties influence gas content distribution on a regional and local scale reservoir conditions affect gas content more locally within specific fields or individual wells the potential for high gas content is controlled directly by the amount of thermogenic and secondary biogenic gases generated from the coal which in turn are controlled by burial history maceral composition and basin hydrodynamics variability in mineral matter ash and moisture content sorption behavior among macerals diffusion coefficients and permeability result in heterogeneous gas content distribution gas content decreases with decreasing pressure and temperature and coal beds become undersaturated with respect to methane during basin uplift and cooling gas content generally increases where conventional and hydrodynamic trapping of coal gases occur and may decrease in areas of active recharge with downward flow potential and or convergent flow where there is no mechanism for entrapment

the surface properties of small asteroids peculiar betulia a case study abstract we present the results of extensive thermal infrared observations of the c type near earth asteroid 1580 betulia obtained in june 2002 with the 3 m nasa infrared telescope facility irtf on mauna kea hawaii betulia is a highly unusual object for which earlier radiometric observations interpreted on the basis of simple thermal models indicated a surface of high thermal inertia a high thermal inertia implies a lack of thermally insulating regolith radiometric observations of other asteroids of comparable size indicate that regolith is present in nearly all cases knowledge of the surface thermal properties of small near earth asteroids is crucial for meaningful calculations of the yarkovsky effect which is invoked to explain the delivery of collisional fragments from the main belt into near earth orbits and apparently has a significant influence on the orbital evolution of potentially hazardous near earth asteroids furthermore apart from being an indicator of the presence of thermally insulating regolith on the surface of an asteroid the thermal inertia determines the magnitude of the diurnal temperature variation and is therefore of great importance in the design of instrumentation for lander missions to small asteroids in the case of betulia our database is sufficiently broad to allow the use of more sophisticated thermal models than were available for earlier radiometric observations the measured fluxes have been fitted with thermal model emission continua to determine the asteroid s size and geometric albedo p v fits obtained with a new thermophysical model imply an effective diameter of 4 57 0 46 km and an albedo of 0 077 0 015 and indicate a moderate surface thermal inertia of around 180 j m 2 s 0 5 k 1 it is difficult to reconcile our results with earlier work which indicate a larger diameter for betulia and a high thermal inertia surface of bare rock

glacial isostatic adjustment in fennoscandia for a laterally heterogeneous earth glaciation and deglaciation in fennoscandia during the last glacial cycles has significantly perturbed the earth s equilibrium figure changes in the earth s solid and geoidal surfaces due to external and internal mass redistributions are recorded in sequences of ancient coastlines now either submerged or uplifted and are still visible in observations of present day motions of the surface and glacially induced anomalies in the earth s gravitational field these observations become increasingly sophisticated with the availability of gps measurements and new satellite gravity missions observational evidence of the mass changes is widely used to constrain the radial viscosity structure of the earth s mantle however lateral changes in earth model properties are usually not taken into account as most global models of glacial isostatic adjustment assume radial symmetry for the earth model this simplifying assumption contrasts with seismological evidence of significant lateral variations in the earth s crust and upper mantle throughout the fennoscandian region we compare predictions of glacial isostatic adjustment based on an ice model over the fennoscandian region for the last glacial cycle for both radially symmetric and fully 3 d earth models our results clearly reveal the importance of lateral variations in lithospheric thickness and asthenospheric viscosity for glacially induced model predictions relative sea level predictions can differ by up to 10 20 m uplift rate predictions by 1 3 mm yr 1 and free air gravity anomaly predictions by 2 4 mgal when a realistic 3 d earth structure as proposed by seismic modelling is taken into account

global sea level trend in the past century data derived from tide gauge stations throughout the world indicate that the mean sea level rose by about 12 centimeters in the past century the sea level change has a high correlation with the trend of global surface air temperature a large part of the sea level rise can be accounted for in terms of the thermal expansion of the upper layers of the ocean the results also represent weak indirect evidence for a net melting of the continental ice sheets

the viscoelastic relaxation of a realistically stratified earth and a further analysis of postglacial rebound summary we discuss the isostatic adjustment of the earth in response to pleistocene deglaciation and derive constraints on the earth s viscosity profile we model the earth as viscoelastic self gravitating realistically stratified and spherically symmetric it is shown that the earth s relaxation eigenspectrum besides possessing a small set of well known discrete modes also includes infinitely dense sets of modes a continuous spectrum which separate into classes that depend on the principal restoring force of the mode methods for estimating the continuous spectrum are discussed and the effects on the predicted uplift are assessed we find that the effects of the continuous spectrum are far less important than those of the discrete modes though the presence of the continuous spectrum can make the discrete modes more difficult to identify the continuous spectrum does become important when computing the rebound due to more recent loading such as might be associated with present day changes in polar ice we use our model to refine predictions of the earth s response to pleistocene glacial loading with particular emphasis on implications for mantle viscosity we have used time histories that are consistent with the recently recalibrated 14c time scale a special effort is made to match the geologic records of sea level at sites in the vicinity of hudson bay we find consistent with the results of other authors that the curvatures of the records are sensitive indicators of lower mantle viscosity but that there are inconsistencies between the records at different sites however we find we are also able to change the predicted curvatures by modifying the temporal and spatial distribution of the ice loads if we assume a factor of 50 increase in viscosity between the upper and lower mantles and if we assume that the ice on the eastern side of hudson bay melted a few thousand years later than the ice on the western side a result consistent with recent geologic evidence we are able to match the observed sea level data about as well as we are able to if we use instead a uniform mantle viscosity profile a model with a factor of 50 jump in viscosity predicts a large free air gravity anomaly over northern canada that is reasonably consistent with what is observed whereas a uniform viscosity model does not though some authors have argued that the observed north american gravity anomaly may be mostly a consequence of mantle convection and largely unrelated to postglacial rebound our objective here is not to present a preferred ice model or viscosity profile rather we conclude only that the interpretation of the data is ambiguous and that the mantle viscosity profile can not yet be uniquely inferred from them

glacial isostatic adjustment and the radial viscosity profile from inverse modeling 1 a formal inverse procedure is used to infer radial mantle viscosity profiles from several observations related to the glacial isostatic adjustment process the data sets consist of late pleistocene and holocene sea level data from scandinavia the barents sea central europe canada and the far field as well as observations of changes in the earth s rotation and gravitational field and present day uplift and gravity changes in scandinavia inferences of mantle viscosity are robust against assumptions such as the a priori viscosity model and model discretization however the quality of ice sheet reconstruction remains crucial for the inverse inference the importance to discuss regional mantle viscosity models in view of the lateral variability in mantle properties has been evident our inference suggests a two order of magnitude increase of mantle viscosity with depth and volume averaged upper and lower mantle viscosities around 7 1020 and 2 1022 pa s respectively mantle viscosity does not need to increase sharply across the 660 km seismic discontinuity the viscosity profiles suggested are also able to reconcile the large scale geoid anomaly related to mantle convection

predominance of long wavelength heterogeneity in the mantle analysis of travel time anomalies of long period shear waves recorded by the global digital seismographic network indicates that mantle heterogeneities which probably reflect patterns of mantle convection occur most prominently on length scales greater than about 6 000 km when projected onto a two dimensional map at the earth s surface models of mantle convection will need to be able to produce a similar power spectrum

effects of igneous intrusions on coal petrology pore fracture and coalbed methane characteristics in hongyang handan and huaibei coalfields north china article i nfo the effects of igneous intrusions have proved to be important for the exploration and development of coalbed methane in many coal basins however the studies of the influences of localized intrusions on coalbed meth ane reservoirs are still insufficient in the context of five typical dike sill intrusion patterns i e dike cut through dike cut in floor intrusion by sill roof intrusion by sill and dual intrusions of roof and floor by sills this study investigates the changes of coal organic composition and pores fractures resulting from igneous intrusions the influences of igneous intrusions on coal composition mainly include the decrease of vitrinites especially telocollinite and the increase of inertinites contents as well as the formation of secondary devolatilization vacuoles and of exogenous desiccation microfractures the vacuoles have size of 0 1 10 m and the microfractures are commonly developed with a wide space and a significantly short length the microfractures typically have irregular dendritic filamentous and turtleback textures and densi ties of hundreds per 9 cm 2 the influences of igneous intrusions on coal pores and fractures vary significantly depending on the intrusion patterns the coal ranks after the intrusion and the nature of the adjacent forma tion surrounding the intrusion for the coals with a vrr 4 2 the intrusion significantly reduced the coal pore development for the coals with a vrr from 2 1 4 2 the development of the coal pores improved with decreasing distance to the contact for the coals with a vrr b2 1 the intrusion resulted in a slight improvement of the coal pore development a possible explanation for the increasing gas content near the intrusion is that the secondary vacuoles and microfractures induced an increase in the gas storage capacity and in the permeability of the coal reservoir the detailed intrusion patterns of sills and dikes contribute to the formations of the coalbed methane accumulation in coal seams and to the coal generated gas accumula tion in the reservoir of the highly permeable surrounding rocks

collisional evolution of the asteroid belt abstract a new synthesis of asteroid collisional evolution is motivated by the question of whether most asteroids larger than 1 km size are strengthless gravitational aggregates rubble piles near found eros not to be a rubble pile but a shattered collisional fragment with a through going fracture system and an average of about 20 m regolith cover of four asteroids visited by spacecraft none appears likely to be a rubble pile except perhaps mathilde nevertheless current understanding of asteroid collisions and size dependent strength and the observed distribution of rotation rates versus size have led to a theoretical consensus that many or most asteroids larger than 1 km should be rubble piles is eros the best observed asteroid highly unusual because it is not a rubble pile is mathilde if it is a rubble pile like most asteroids what would be expected for the small asteroid itokawa the muses c sample return target an asteroid size distribution is synthesized from the minor planet center listing and results of the sloan digital sky survey an infrared space observatory survey the small main belt asteroid spectroscopic survey and the infrared astronomical satellite survey a new picture emerges of asteroid collisional evolution in which the well known dohnanyi result that the size distribution tends toward a self similar form with a 2 5 index power law is overturned because of scale dependent collision physics survival of a basaltic crust on vesta can be accommodated together with formation of many exposed metal cores the lifetimes against destruction are estimated as 3 gyr at the size of eros 10 gyr at ten times that size and 40 gyr at the size of vesta eros as a shattered collisional fragment is not highly unusual the new picture reveals the new possibility of a transition size in the collisional state where asteroids below 5 km size would be primarily collisional breakup fragments whereas much larger asteroids are mostly eroded or shattered survivors of collisions in this case well defined families would be found in asteroids larger than about 5 km size but for smaller asteroids families may no longer be readily separated from a background population moreover the measured boulder size distribution on eros is re interpreted as a sample of impactor size distributions in the asteroid belt the regolith on eros may result largely from the last giant impact and the same may be true of itokawa in which case about a meter of regolith would be expected there even a small asteroid like itokawa may be a shattered object with regolith cover

coal reservoir characteristics and coalbed methane resource assessment in huainan and huaibei coalfields southern north china abstract the huaibei and huainan coalfields in southern north china contain abundant coalbed methane cbm resources 1 1 10 12 m 3 net accumulated thicknesses of all minable coal seams are 18 32 m in huainan and 8 18 m in huaibei coalfields coal rank in the huainan coalfield high volatile a and b bituminous r o 0 65 0 85 is generally controlled by geothermal metamorphism in comparison coal rank in the huaibei coalfield varies from high volatile a bituminous to semi anthracites 0 8 to 2 8 r o and is controlled by the influence of the cretaceous yanshanian magmatic metamorphism in both coalfields coal reservoirs have low permeability values of 0 0013 0 224 md and porosity of 0 9 10 9 pores in coals are dominated by those with diameter 2 in both coalfields the abundance of microfractures in coals is related to the coal structures commonly more abundant in sheared coals 200 per 9 cm 2 than in the normally structured coals 2 the in place gas content is generally 8 16 m 3 t in huaibei and 10 30 m 3 t in huainan coalfields these data yield an estimated in place cbm resource of 375 247 10 9 m 3 for the huaibei and 722 677 10 9 m 3 for the huainan coalfields based on the cbm resource investigation and reservoir evaluation the most prospective target areas for cbm production are evaluated which include the nanping taoyuan mines of the southern suxian deep coal district and zhuxianzhuang and luling mines in eastern suxian area of the huaibei coalfield and the area around the panji 2 mine in panji xieqiao coal mining districts in the huainan coalfield

controls on methane sorption capacity of indian coals details of methane sorption properties of some indian coals ranging in rank from high volatile bituminous c 0 62 ro max to medium volatile bituminous coal 1 46 ro max were investigated to determine the major factors influencing gas adsorption capacity and desorption rate variables studied included moisture content mineral matter content rank and coal type maceral composition adsorption isotherm analysis of dry coals showed that adsorption capacity followed a second order polynomial trend with rank equilibrium moist samples showed a linear increase in adsorption capacity with rank and had a significantly reduced adsorption capacity compared to the dry coals with the reduction being related to the moisture content mineral matter acted as a simple diluent to the gas adsorption capacity of the coals and was found to be nonadsorbent adsorption capacity moist was reduced by 0 32 cm3 g 10 ft3 gas t for every 1 increase in the ash yield bright and dull coal lithotypes showed strong separation in their adsorption capacities on an as analyzed basis with the bright coals adsorbing greater quantities of gas on a dmmf basis however no relationship was observed between coal type and gas storage capacity comparison of maceral composition with adsorption capacity dry confirmed this observation effective diffusivity de of methane through the coal was seen to be affected by coal type and rank effective diffusivity de decreased as rank increased which is related to the increasing microporous nature of the coal bulk coals tested had 2 3 times larger effective diffusivities than bright coals and dull coals had intermediate rates the larger de values for the bulk coals may be related to the presence of collodetrinite coupled with mineral matter which acts as higher permeability pathways for the gas compared with the high ash dull coals dominated by inertinite macerals differences were noted with similar age permian australian coals where methane adsorption capacities were larger and coal type had a stronger influence on adsorption capacity begin page 202

evaluation of geological features for deep coalbed methane reservoirs in the dacheng salient jizhong depression china abstract the dacheng salient of the northeast jizhong depression is one of the most promising areas for deep coalbed methane cbm development in china this work investigates the permo carboniferous c p taiyuan and shanxi formation coals and cbm geology and gas accumulation characteristics in the dacheng salient based on field data from 24 wells and laboratory measurements of eight coal samples and eight mudstone and sandstones from exploration well d1 1 the results show that the coal rank in the dacheng salient is a high volatile c bituminous coal to low volatile bituminous coal 0 54 1 85 r o controlled by the magmatism in the region the coals vary from 2 94 to 8 58 in porosity and 0 263 m 2 g to 2 6 m 2 g in bet surface area the in situ permeability is low normally less than 0 5 10 3 m 2 methane isothermal adsorption measurements of five coal samples reveal that their maximum adsorption capacity on an as received basis varies from 17 13 to 25 98 m 3 t with an apparent relationship with ash yield the roof and floor of coal seams are mainly mudstone with minor quantities of sandy mudstone and carbonate all have the ability to be suitable cap rocks with adequate sealing capacity and large breakthrough pressure the in place gas content range from 10 23 to 1 41 m 3 t with a decreasing trend from no 3 to no 6 coal seam group in the d1 1 well due to effects by the active ground water near the east jinghai dacheng fault however the gas content and the gas saturation increase with burial depth and ground water salinity and decrease with coal rank finally based on a comprehensive analysis of coal thickness gas content hydrogeology conditions roof floor and depth properties this study reveals that the best prospective target areas for cbm production are the south central parts of the dacheng salient at1200 1600 m in depth

coalbed methane characteristics of gates formation coals northeastern british columbia effect of maceral composition the majority of research reported on methane adsorption characteristics of coal seams has focused on vitrinite rich coals however western canadian coals are more inertinite rich than those of the western united states and are shown to differ in gas adsorption characteristics the influence of maceral composition upon gas adsorption characteristics of medium volatile coal samples from the middle cretaceous gates formation of northeastern british columbia was investigated lithotype coal facies samples were analyzed for surface area maceral and mineral composition and methane adsorption standard coal analyses were also performed proximate low temperature ash and equilibrium moisture the vitrinite content of the samples analyzed ranges from 18 to 95 vol min ral matter free the ash yield varies from 4 4 to 33 7 wt both maceral composition and mineral matter content have an important influence on adsorption characteristics as indicated by carbon dioxide surface areas and methane adsorption isotherms on a mineral matter free basis the amount of methane adsorbed generally increases with vitrinite enrichment the lowest methane adsorption occurs in the sample with the highest inertinite content carbon dioxide surface areas of the lithotypes range from 87 to 176 m2 g on a raw coal basis and from 99 to 184 m2 g on a mineral matter free basis surface area generally decreases with increased mineral matter content and increases with increased vitrinite content the increase in adsorption of both methane and carbon dioxide with increased vitrinite concentration is interpreted a resulting from differences in the pore size distribution of vitrinite and inertinite vitrinite is predominantly microporous whereas inertinite is meso to macroporous the monolayer volumes of carbon dioxide as calculated from the dubininradushkevich equation are higher than those of methane as determined from the langmuir equation but are correlated the methane adsorption isotherms and surface area data indicate that the maceral compositional variations in coal are at least as significant as coal rank in determining the potential volume of adsorbed methane and thus the coalbed methane potential of a deposit

hydrodynamic and stratigraphic controls for a large coalbed methane accumulation in ferron coals of east central utah abstract upper cretaceous coals within the ferron sandstone member of the mancos shale contain large volumes of coalbed methane coals at the northern end of the 80 mile long 129 km ferron trend have produced more than 200 billion cubic feet bcf 5663 10 6 m 3 of coalbed methane with daily production of 260 million cubic feet per day mmcfd 7 36 10 6 m 3 day from 470 wells during november 2000 core data from exploratory wells drilled along trend to the south indicate that the gas content of the coals decreases dramatically from north to south even though the rank and maturity of the coals decreases only slightly the area with lowest gas content correlates with the outcrop of the ferron coals hydrodynamic studies have shown that the ferron coals are aquifers that are recharged from the wasatch plateau to the west regional mapping indicates that the productive fields are large stratigraphic traps where the coals pinchout updip into tight marine shales to the east much of the produced gas is secondary biogenic gas and migrated thermogenic gas that has moved from the wasatch plateau and south margin of the uinta basin respectively further south near the town of emery coals are present at the surface but most of the gas has been flushed out of the coals due to reduction of reservoir pressure and active water flow from the west therefore the entire ferron trend probably contained tremendous volumes of stratigraphically trapped coalbed methane before uplift and erosion exposed the southern coals to the atmosphere

the characteristics of coal reservoir pores and coal facies in liulin district hedong coal field of china the composition rank coal facies and coal pore structure characteristics of 15 coal samples were investigated systemically using methods of lithotype analysis maceral analysis proximate analysis mercury porosimetry analysis and nitrogen adsorption analysis these samples were directly collected from the working faces of no 4 8 9 seams in liulin district eastern margin ordos basin china four types of paleoenvironment including a wet forest swamp an intergradation forest swamp a drained forest swamp and a fresh water peat swamp were distinguished by lithotype and merceral analysis an r cluster analysis was performed to demonstrate the correlations between the coal facies and the pore structures the results showed that coal rank is the primary factor affecting the development of micropores and transition pores whereas coal facies control the development of seepage pores in similar coalification conditions especially in a local district and in a seam this work suggests that the vertical variations observed in coal properties macerals vitrinite reflectance mineral matters porosity bet specific area pore size distributions and pores connectivity were controlled by groundwater level fluctuations indicated by variations in the ground water index gwi in the ancient mires due to different accommodation and peat accumulation rates comparison of the porosity characteristics of various coal reservoirs developed in various coal facies indicates that wet forest swamp facies is favorable to the formation of a coalbed methane reservoir because of reasonable pore structure and good connectivity intergradation forest swamp facies rank the second and drained forest swamp facies are less advantageous

ice 3g a new global model of late pleistocene deglaciation based upon geophysical predictions of post glacial relative sea level change a new high resolution global model of late pleistocene deglaciation is inferred on the basis of geophysical predictions of postglacial relative sea level variations in which the ice ocean solid earth interaction is treated in a gravitationally self consistent fashion for the purpose of these analyses the radial viscoelastic structure of the planet is assumed known on the basis of previously published sensitivity tests on solutions of the forward problem only radiocarbon controlled relative sea level histories from sites that were actually ice covered with one or two additions are employed to constrain the model leaving relative sea level rsl data from sites that were not ice covered to be employed to confirm its consistency results for these confirmatory analyses are reported elsewhere here the new deglaciation model referred to as ice 3g is compared to previous models derived by several independent means and tested against a number of additional observations other than sea level histories including geologically controlled retreat isochrones oxygen isotope data from deep sea sedimentary cores and coral terrace elevations the latter two observations strongly constrain the net sea level rise that has occurred since the onset of deglaciation and therefore the mass of ice that melted during the last glacial interglacial transition

possible controls of hydrogeological and stress regimes on the producibility of coalbed methane in upper cretaceous tertiary strata of the alberta basin canada the coalbed methane potential and producibility of any coal bearing strata are strongly affected by the hydrogeological regime of formation waters and by coal permeability which in turn depends on the effective stress regime of the coals peat that accumulated in the alberta basin during the late cretaceous and early tertiary led to the formation of coal deposits that may contain significant coalbed methane resources the flow of formation waters plays an important role in the maintenance and producibility of this resource the present day flow is driven by gravity topography and erosional rebound and is controlled by rock permeability and the presence of gas saturated sandstones the estimated gas in place in the tertiary upper cretaceous coals decreases significantly with stratigraphic age ranging between less than 2 bcf mi2 in the lower coal zones and 12 bcf mi2 in the uppermost coals the gas content especially of the deeper coals is lower than would be expected for the corresponding coal rank and burial depth most likely because the underpressuring has caused the release of gas from the coals and accumulation in adjacent sands the shallow coals although of low rank may contain important amounts of late stage biogenic methane the salinity of formation water in shallow coal seams where the flow is driven by topography is low generally less than 1500 mg l although in places it reaches 3000 5000 mg l the salinity of formation water in the deeper underpressured strata in the west central part of the basin is significantly higher reaching 18 000 mg l this affects treatment and or disposal strategies with regard to the water produced concurrent to coalbed methane the producibility of this resource depends on coal permeability which decreases west southwestward with increasing burial depth from the order of several darcys in the shallow zones to millidarcys in the deep zones the minimum effective stress which affects coal permeability by closing fractures increases west southwestward from zero at the erosional edge of these strata to approximately 20 mpa near the rocky mountain deformation front fractures including those in coal seams will generally be vertical and will propagate on a southwest northeast axis along the direction of the maximum horizontal stress in a direction generally perpendicular to the rocky mountain deformation front considering the hydrogeological and stress regimes in conjunction with estimations of the gas content in coals the region with probably good coalbed methane potential and producibility are the ardley coal zone in the scollard formation and maybe to a lesser extent the coal zones of the stratigraphically deeper edmonton and belly river groups along their respective subcrop in central and southern alberta the deep edmonton and belly river strata in western and central alberta have most likely a reduced coalbed methane potential as a result of lower gas content and of low permeability these regional considerations need to be applied against local studies of coal thickness rank permeability and gas content to identify the best targets for coalbed methane exploration and production

on the effects of petrographic composition on coalbed methane sorption abstract the effect of petrographic composition on the methane sorption capacity has been determined for a suite of coals and organic rich shales subbituminous and bituminous coals were separated into bright and dull lithotypes by hand picking the methane sorption capacities range between 0 5 and 23 9 cm 3 g at a pressure of 6 mpa the low volatile bituminous canmore coal and the anthracite sample have the highest capacities with the natural coke having the lowest for low rank coals there is no significant difference between bright and dull samples except for one coal with the dull sample having a greater sorption capacity than its bright equivalent for higher rank coals the bright samples have a greater methane capacity than the dull samples and the difference between sample pairs increases with rank the boghead coal samples have the highest sorption capacities in the liptinite rich coals suite and are higher than subbituminous to medium volatile bituminous samples pore size distribution indicates that methane is held as solution gas in liptinite rich coals and by physical sorption in micropores in liptinite poor coals these contrasting processes illustrate that liptinite rich samples need to be independently assessed the positive relationship between reactive inertinite content and methane sorption capacity occurs within the subbituminous to medium volatile bituminous coals because the reactive inertinite is structurally similar to vitrinite and have a higher microporosity than non reactive inertinite reactivity of inertinite should be assessed in cbm studies of dull coals to provide a better understanding of petrographic composition effects on methane capacity

the bifrost project gps determined 3 d displacement rates in fennoscandia from 800 days of continuous observations in the swepos network abstract this presentation summarizes results obtained from 800 days of operation of swepos the swedish permanent gps array located in the area of the fennoscandian land uplift swepos is the main measuring device for the bifrost project aiming primarily at determination of crustal motions and changes in global sea level in conjunction with postglacial rebound as a future prospect the project will contribute to determine present day changes in the oceanic water budget as well as strive for a more complete understanding of the viscoelastic structure of crust and mantle we show solutions of site positions obtained from the daily processing of the gps observations we determine their variations in time discerning them from plate or frame orientation and discuss a number of perturbation effects among these the possibility of random walk monument motion is considered the feasibility of single site solutions rather than baseline pairs is demonstrated on the basis of 800 days of operation of the permanent network data analysis is able to confirm the general rebound pattern comparison with both modelling results and evidence from mareograph and precise levelling shows high rates of vertical surface displacement from gps measurements in the centre of the pleistocene glaciation region we discuss the possibility of rate biases due to problems with the terrestrial reference frames

lateral asthenospheric viscosity variations and postglacial rebound a case study for the barents sea the effect of lateral asthenospheric viscosity variations on observable signatures related to postglacial rebound in the barents sea is studied using a finite element approach to discretize the problem a comparison between a laterally homogeneous reference earth model and a laterally heterogeneous earth model is performed the results indicate that a change in asthenospheric viscosity of about three orders of magnitude influences predictions of land uplift up to 10 20 m present day velocities up to 0 5 1 5 mm a and present day gravity anomalies up to 0 4 0 8 mgal in the northwestern part of the barents sea region

geological controls on coalbed methane reservoir capacity and gas content the influence of coal composition and rank on coalbed methane reservoir capacity gas content and gas saturation have been investigated for a series of australian canadian and united states coals globally there is no or little correlation between coal rank and methane adsorption capacity as commonly assumed although in particular basins there are general trends with rank and composition micropore1 capacity and surface area determined from low pressure carbon dioxide adsorption isotherms 0 c decrease and then increase with rank passing through a minimum in the high volatile bituminous coal rank there is no consistent variation in modal micropore size or size distribution with rank for suites of isorank coals there is a poor permian bulli and wongawilli seams australia to good positive correlation gates formation coal seams lower cretaceous canada between vitrinite content and methane adsorption capacity dry ash free and as received bases for each isorank coal suite there is a good correlation between micropore capacity and abundance of vitrinite and high pressure methane adsorption capacity comparison of coals of similar composition but from different isorank suites indicates however that the coals with the highest methane adsorption capacity do not necessarily have the highest micropore capacity such results are counterintuitive most pore volume available for methane adsorption is generally assumed to be microporosity it is suspected that moisture prevents methane from accessing some microporosity or competes with methane for adsorption space carbon dioxide micropore capacity which is performed on a dry basis may thus not reflect the microporosity available for gas adsorption in moisture equilibrated coals alternatively because of differing physical and chemical properties of carbon dioxide and methane apparent microporosity available to carbon dioxide due to greater energy of adsorption may not be available to methane total desorbed gas from canister analyses of sydney basin australian coals suggests that most coals are under saturated for a small data set the degree of saturation is negatively correlated with permeability r 0 78 suggesting preferential gas leakage from the higher permeability coals which are vitrite rich some degree of under saturation is probably the result of increased reservoir capacity as a consequence of uplift of the coal seams and thus lower temperatures following gas generation rates of desorption are correlated with total gas content r 0 79 but do not correlate with rank or any compositional parameter

pleistocene deglaciation and the global gravity field the present day global geoid and free air gravity anomaly signals induced by pleistocene deglaciation have been computed along with their secular variations a revised green function has been derived for the free air gravity anomaly and we find that an earth model with a lower mantle viscosity moderately larger than the upper mantle value satisfies observations of the anomaly over both hudson s bay and fennoscandia using this preferred earth model the predicted global geoid anomaly map is characterized by peak negative values of 36 7 9 4 and 21 9 m over hudson s bay northern europe and antarctica respectively and by a smooth small amplitude 2 5 m upwarping over the major ocean basins although the field has an order of magnitude less power than the observed there is a significant spatial correlation between the two inferences of mantle viscosity based upon comparisons between the observed geoid and the computed deglaciation induced anomaly are hampered by the large contribution from the convective circulation in the earth s mantle we have subtracted a predicted convection signal based on seismic tomography from the observed field however the residual geoid thus obtained is still too inaccurate to allow a useful comparison in contrast a filtered version of the observed geoid over canada which retains harmonic coefficients in the degree range 10 22 provides a relatively uncontaminated by convection datum that is indeed satisfied by the preferred earth model secular variations in the earth s gravitational field are naturally dominated by the signal from pleistocene deglaciation in this respect we compute zonal harmonics in the expansion of the present day rate of change of the geopotential and in particular we predict amplitudes comparable to that for the previously analysed j2 for j4 j5 j7 and j9 all of which reflect in large part the response due to the melting of the massive laurentide ice sheet this analysis suggests that measurement of these higher order secular variations of the zonal harmonics based upon analysis of long time series of lageos ranging data could provide very useful additional constraints on the radial variation of mantle viscosity these constraints along with all others described in this paper are shown to be relatively insensitive to assumptions concerning the deflection during the glacial isostatic adjustment process of the 400 and 670 km density discontinuities within the mantle

glacial rebound of the british isles iii constraints on mantle viscosity summary observations of sea level change since the time of the last glacial maximum provide important constraints on the response of the earth to changes in surface loading on time scales of 103 104 years this response is conveniently described by an effective elastic lithospheric thickness and effective viscosities for one or more mantle layers considerable trade off between the parameters describing these layers can occur and different combinations can give rise to comparable predictions of sea level change in particular the trade off between lithospheric thickness and upper mantle viscosity can be important and for any reasonable value for the lithospheric thickness a corresponding mantle viscosity structure can be found that gives a plausible comparison of sealevel predictions with observations in particular thin lithosphere models will lead to low estimates for the upper mantle viscosity while thick lithosphere models lead to high viscosity values however either solution may represent only a local minimum in the model parameter space and may not correspond to the optimum solution it becomes important therefore that in the inversion of observational data a comprehensive search is conducted throughout the entire model parameter space to ensure that the solution identified does indeed correspond to the optimum solution the sea level data for the british isles lend themselves well to such an inversion because of the relatively high quality of the data the good geographic distribution of the data relative to the former ice sheet and reasonable observational constraints on the dimensions of the former ice sheet and on its retreat furthermore because of the contribution to the sea level signal from the distant ice sheets as well as from the melt water load the observational data base for the region also has some resolving power for the viscosity of the deeper mantle the parameter space explored is defined by up to five mantle layers the lithosphere of effective elastic thickness d and a series of upper mantle layers i 2 4 extending down to depths of 200 400 and 670 km respectively each of viscosity qi and a lower mantle layer of viscosity qlm extending down to the coremantle boundary the range of parameters explored is 30 d i 120 km 3 x loi9 iqi

glacial rebound of the british isles ii a high resolution high precision model summary observations of ice movements across the british isles and of sea level changes around the shorelines during late devensian time after about 25 000 yr bp have been used to establish a high spatial and temporal resolution model for the rebound of great britain and associated sea level change the sea level observations include sites within the margins of the former ice sheet as well as observations outside the glaciated regions such that it has been possible to separate unknown earth model parameters from some ice sheet model parameters in the inversion of the glaciohydro isostatic equations the mantle viscosity profile is approximated by a number of radially symmetric layers representing the lithosphere the upper mantle as two layers from the base of the lithosphere to the phase transition boundary at 400 km the transition zone down to 670 km depth and the lower mantle no evidence is found to support a strong layering in viscosity above 670 km other than the high viscosity lithospheric layer models with a low viscosity zone in the upper mantle or models with a marked higher viscosity in the transition zone are less satisfactory than models in which the viscosity is constant from the base of the lithosphere to the 670 km boundary in contrast a marked increase in viscosity is required across this latter boundary the optimum effective parameters for the mantle beneath great britain are a lithospheric thickness of about 65 km a mantle viscosity above 670 km of about 4 5 lo2 pa s and a viscosity below 670 km greater than 4 x lo2 pas

a survey of karin cluster asteroids with the spitzer space telescope abstract the karin cluster is one of the youngest known families of main belt asteroids dating back to a collisional event only 5 8 0 2 myr ago using the spitzer space telescope we have photometrically sampled the thermal continua 3 5 22 m of 17 karin cluster asteroids of different sizes down to the smallest members discovered so far in order to make the first direct measurements of their sizes and albedos and study the physical properties of their surfaces our targets are also amongst the smallest main belt asteroids observed to date in the mid infrared the derived diameters range from 17 3 km for 832 karin to 1 5 km for 75176 with typical uncertainties of 10 the mean albedo is p v 0 215 0 015 compared to 0 20 0 07 for 832 karin itself for h 11 2 0 3 consistent with the view that the karin asteroids are closely related physically as well as dynamically the albedo distribution 0 12 p v 0 32 is consistent with the range associated with s type asteroids but the variation from one object to another appears to be significant contrary to the case for near earth asteroids our data show no evidence of an albedo dependence on size however the mean albedo is lower than expected for young fresh s type surfaces suggesting that space weathering can darken main belt asteroid surfaces on very short timescales our data are also suggestive of a connection between surface roughness and albedo which may reflect rejuvenation of weathered surfaces by impact gardening while the available data allow only estimates of lower limits for thermal inertia we find no evidence for the relatively high values of thermal inertia reported for some similarly sized near earth asteroids our results constitute the first observational confirmation of the legitimacy of assumptions made in recent modeling of the formation of the karin cluster via a single catastrophic collision 5 8 0 2 myr ago

methanogenic pathways of coal bed gas in the powder river basin united states the geologic factor abstract coal bed gas of the tertiary fort union and wasatch formations in the powder river basin in wyoming and montana u s was interpreted as microbial in origin by previous studies based on limited data on the gas and water composition and isotopes associated with the coal beds to fully evaluate the microbial origin of the gas and mechanisms of methane generation additional data for 165 gas and water samples from 7 different coal bed methane bearing coal bed reservoirs were collected basinwide and correlated to the coal geology and stratigraphy the c1 c2 c3 ratio and vitrinite reflectance of coal and organic shale permitted differentiation between microbial gas and transitional thermogenic gas in the central part of the basin analyses of methane 13c and d carbon dioxide 13c and water d values indicate gas was generated primarily from microbial co2 reduction but with significant gas generated by microbial methyl type fermentation aceticlastic in some areas of the basin microbial co2 reduction occurs basinwide but is generally dominant in paleocene fort union formation coals in the central part of the basin whereas microbial methyl type fermentation is common along the northwest and east margins isotopically light methane 13c is distributed along the basin margins where d is also depleted indicating that both co2 reduction and methyl type fermentation pathways played major roles in gas generation but gas from the latter pathway overprinted gas from the former pathway more specifically along the northwest basin margin gas generation by methyl type fermentation may have been stimulated by late stage infiltration of groundwater recharge from clinker areas which flowed through highly fractured and faulted coal aquifers also groundwater recharge controlled a change in gas composition in the shallow eocene wasatch formation with the increase of nitrogen and decrease of methane composition of the coal bed gas other geologic factors such as burial thermal and maturation history lateral and vertical continuity and coalification of the coal beds also played a significant role in controlling methanogenic pathways and provided new perspectives on gas evolution and emplacement the early stage gas produced by co2 reduction has mixed with transitional thermogenic gas in the deeper central parts of the powder river basin to form old gas whereas along the basin margins the overprint of gas from methyl type fermentation represents new gas thus a clear understanding of these geologic factors is necessary to relate the microbiological biogeochemical and hydrological processes involved in the generation of coal bed gas