observations on fluorinite and fluorescent vitrinite with the transmission electron microscope abstract transmission electron microscopy tem has been used to study fluorinite occurrences in four coals ranging in rank from soft brown coal to high volatile bituminous the fluorinite has a substructure of lipoid rich lamellar and nodular units about 0 1 0 5 m across these components together with enclosing humic matter and in some cases thin cuticle appear to derive from leaves or leaf like material from vascular plants fluorescent vitrinite in one of the coal samples of bituminous rank was also studied with tem this fluorescence is attributable to exsudatinite like inclusions of petroleum origin within the humic matter of the vitrinite

ice core evidence for extensive melting of the greenland ice sheet in the last interglacial evidence from ice at the bottom of ice cores from the canadian arctic islands and camp century and dye 3 in greenland suggests that the greenland ice sheet melted extensively or completely during the last interglacial period more than 100 ka thousand years ago in contrast to earlier interpretations the presence of dirt particles in the basal ice has previously been thought to indicate that the base of the ice sheets had melted and that the evidence for the time of original growth of these ice masses had been destroyed however the particles most likely blew onto the ice when the dimensions of the ice caps and ice sheets were much smaller ice texture gas content and other evidence also suggest that the basal ice at each drill site is superimposed ice a type of ice typical of the early growth stages of an ice cap or ice sheet if the present day ice masses began their growth during the last interglacial the ice sheet from the earlier illinoian glacial period must have competely or largely melted during the early part of the same interglacial period if such melting did occur the 6 meter higher than present sea level during the sangamon cannot be attributed to disintegration of the west antarctic ice sheet as has been suggested

11 000 yrs of environmental change in the northwest passage a multiproxy core record from central parry channel canadian high arctic article i nfo piston core 97022 004pc 74 48 0 n 97 05 9 w 267 m water depth represents a rare paleoenvironmental archive from the understudied west central canadian arctic archipelago lithological biogeochemical and microfossil dinoflagellate cysts non pollen palynomorphs benthic and planktonic foraminifera character istics in combination with a chronostratigraphy based on seventeen radiocarbon dates show seven promi nent paleoenvironmental episodes since the end of the last regional glaciation the basal diamict zone i records decoupling of previously grounded glacial ice followed by ice proximal conditions zone iia commencing at 10 8 cal ka bp age depth model extrapolation after an interval of pervasive sea ice zone iib ice distal conditions are established zone iic although sparse microfossils are present in glaciomarine sediments zone ii noticeable biological activity with heightened abundances and diversities across all groups begins in the postglacial zone iii 10 3 10 0 cal ka bp when planktonic foraminifera neogloboquadrina pachyderma appear as planktonics are excluded from the study area today due to shal low inter channel sills this likely signals the inflow of relatively warm and saline atlantic derived arctic intermediate water below 250 m presumably facilitated by glacio isostatically enhanced deglacial water depths the subsequent zone iv 10 0 7 0 cal ka bp characterized by heightened biological productivity in both plankton and benthos and reduced seasonal sea ice cover may correspond to a previously proposed holocene thermal maximum this apparent amelioration ends by the mid holocene zone v 7 0 5 7 cal ka bp when arctic intermediate water is excluded from the study area and water depths approach modern values high arctic conditions with seasonal sea ice cover a circulation dominated by arctic ocean surface water and microfossil assemblages similar to modern are found from 5 7 cal ka bp onwards zones vi vii as only minor environmental fluctuations are apparent during the late holocene shorter term climatic episodes e g little ice age are not recognized in this record

are time and temperature the only constraints to the simulation of organic matter maturation abstract confined pyrolysis hydrous pyrolysis and high pressure hydrous pyrolysis were performed with various samples toarcian shale and kerogen woodford shale and kerogen manakam coal and under different experimental conditions in order to test the effects of pyrolysis variables on the simulation of maturation of organic matter results show that i experimental time and temperature are not exchangeable parameters as suggested by first order kinetic law models ii increasing confining pressure 300 1300 bars in gold cell experiments performed on woodford samples has a limited influence on the reduction rate of the oil potential the tsom total soluble organic matter yield and the structure of the polars iii the presence of excess liquid water 0 100 weight in confined pyrolysis experiments does not significantly influence organic matter maturation however comparisons with classic hydrous pyrolysis 200 weight water could indicate major differences in timing and composition of the tsom bitumen expelled fraction as well as of the solid residue it appears that excess water is not necessary to simulate organic matter maturation when the system is sufficiently confined hydrous pyrolysis conditions low partial pressure of products delay woodford kerogen conversion in addition results concerning the mahakam coal suggest that the structure of the organic matter plays an important role concerning the water effect iv increasing water pressure in hydrous conditions 220 1300 bars drastically lowers and delays woodford kerogen maturation quantitative analysis of the water produced during confined pyrolysis and comparison of the extent of aromatization in hydrous and confined pyrolysis suggests that two competing hydrogen transfer mechanisms occur during organic matter pyrolysis this study shows that additional parameters must be defined when comparing the results of the experimental simulation of organic matter maturation

extending the vostok ice core record of palaeoclimate to the penultimate glacial period the ice core record of local temperature dust accumulation and air composition at vostok station antarctica now extends back to the penultimate glacial period 140 200 kyr ago and the end of the preceding interglacial this yields a new glaciological timescale for the whole record which is consistent with ocean records temperatures at vostok appear to have been more uniformly cold in the penultimate glacial period than in the most recent one concentrations of co2 and ch4 correlate well with temperature throughout the record

generation of gas and oil from coal and other terrestrial organic matter abstract late carboniferous permian sedimentary rocks contain the world s largest coal reserves which have generated and released gas but little if any oil in comparison organic matter deposited in lacustrine fluvial deltaic or brackish water sediments has sourced large quantities of waxy oils in countries such as china australia the u s a argentina venezuela and indonesia plus gas and condensate in deltas worldwide why is more oil coming from land derived organic matter disseminated in sediments than from the carboniferous permian coal beds which also are land deposits the answer appears to be in the hydrogen content and the ease of migration when organic matter and coals have high hydrogen contents relative to carbon they can form oil when the hydrogen is low mainly gas is formed most of the world s coal is low in hydrogen whereas much of the terrestrial organic matter disseminated in sediments is higher in hydrogen so it forms more oil also both gas and oil are adsorbed on coal more strongly than on the disseminated kerogen of sedimentary rocks this makes migration of oil out of the coal more difficult compared to migration from conventional shale source rocks

a record of holocene summer climate from a canadian high arctic ice core melt layers in ice cores are formed by melting on the snow pack surface which produces water that percolates down and refreezes in the colder snow layers below melt layers are distinguished by their bubble texture because more ice forms in the snow pack in warm summers than in cool summers the changing concentration with depth of melt layers in snow pits1 2 and ice cores3 5 is an indicator of past summer climate here we report on studies of melt layers in two canadian high arctic surface to bedrock ice cores although changes in elevation of the drill site owing to isostatic depression and uplift may contribute up to 40 of the total climatic signal recorded in the melt layers we interpret their varying concentrations in terms of changing summer temperatures over the past 10 000 years the warmest summers occurred 8 10 kyr ago and the coldest only 150 years ago the summers over the past 100 years have been the warmest for more than 1 000 years but are still not as warm as those of the early holocene the melt layer record is in broad agreement with geological records of glacier retreat during the holocene6 8 indicating that these data also contain information of regional significance

the mass balance of circum arctic glaciers and recent climate change the sum of winter accumulation and summer losses of mass from glaciers and ice sheets net surface mass balance varies with changing climate in the arctic glaciers and ice caps excluding the greenland ice sheet cover about 275 000 km2of both the widely glacierized archipelagos of the canadian norwegian and russian high arctic and the area north of about 60 n in alaska iceland and scandinavia since the 1940s surface mass balance time series of varying length have been acquired from more than 40 arctic ice caps and glaciers most arctic glaciers have experienced predominantly negative net surface mass balance over the past few decades there is no uniform recent trend in mass balance for the entire arctic although some regional trends occur examples are the increasingly negative mass balances for northern alaska due to higher summer temperatures and increasingly positive mass balances for maritime scandinavia and iceland due to increased winter precipitation the negative mass balance of most arctic glaciers may be a response to a step like warming in the early twentieth century at the termination of the cold little ice age arctic ice masses outside greenland are at present contributing about 0 13 mm yr 1to global sea level rise

late quaternary temporal and event classifications great lakes region north america abstract several temporal and event classifications are used for the quaternary glacial and interglacial record in the great lakes region of north america although based on contrasting principles the classifications as practiced are similar to one another in most respects and they differ little from the classification proposed by chamberlin a century ago all are based on stratigraphic units having time transgressive boundaries thus the associated time spans and events are diachronous where application of geochronologic classification based on isochronous boundaries is not practical or useful we advocate the use of diachronic principles to establish local and regional temporal and event classifications diachronic and event classifications based on such principles are proposed herein for the great lakes region well established names including wisconsin sangamon and illinois are used at the episode or glaciation interglaciation rank without significant redefinition the hudson episode interglaciation is introduced for postglacial time the current interglacial interval the wisconsin episode is divided into the ontario elgin and michigan subepisodes in the eastern and northern parts of the great lakes region and into the athens and michigan subepisodes in the southern and western parts of the great lakes region

in situ analysis of solid bitumen in coal examples from the bowen basin and the illinois basin solid bitumen and associated vitrinite from selected coals from the bowen basin and the illinois basin were studied using electron microprobe and micro ftir techniques the coal studied covers a range of vitrinite reflectance from 0 59 to 1 33 carbon content in the bitumen is generally lower than in vitrinite in coals with vitrinite reflectance below 0 67 in coals with reflectance above 0 67 carbon content of bitumen is higher than in vitrinite reflecting higher aromaticity due to hydrocarbon generation sulfur and iron content are comparable between vitrinite and bitumen functional group distribution suggests the presence of two types of bitumen in the illinois basin coals the more aliphatic variety occurring in veins and cleats is interpreted as pre gas generation bitumen and the more aromatic variety filling cells and voids in inertinite as post gas generation bitumen

variations in melt layer frequency in the gisp2 ice core implications for holocene summer temperatures in central greenland the rare melt features in the gisp2 central greenland deep ice core have decreased in frequency over the most recent 7000 years calibration of this change in melt frequency against modern spatial variation of melt frequency and temperature in central greenland and against modern temporal variability of temperatures in central greenland indicates that mean mid summer temperatures have cooled over the most recent 7000 years probably by slightly more than l c if variability of summer temperatures has not changed comparison to grip isotopic records from central greenland and to the melt record from the agassiz ice cap arctic canada suggests some seasonal and regional coherence for this cooling signal as well as for a cold event about 8000 8500 bp

revised models for hydrocarbon generation migration and accumulation in jurassic coal measures of the turpan basin nw china abstract whether or not the lower middle jurassic coal measures in the turpan basin of nw china have generated commercial quantities of liquid petroleums is a problem of considerable importance that remains contentious as it has not yet been resolved unequivocally this study provides evidence against the jurassic humic coals as the only major source for the oils discovered in the taibei depression of this basin and suggests additional significant contributions from the upper permian and middle lower jurassic lacustrine source rocks the carboniferous permian marine source rocks may have been important also in limited locations along the major basement faults molecular and petrographic data indicate that the majority of the middle jurassic strata are currently immature or marginally mature with respect to hydrocarbon generation within the major depocenters the middle lower jurassic coal bearing strata of the baodaowan and xishanyao formations has reached the conventional oil window i e with vitrinite reflectance 0 7 ro pre jurassic upper permian in particular derived hydrocarbons appear to be widespread in extracts of fractured jurassic coal and fine grained rocks large differences have been observed in the absolute concentrations of biomarker compounds in rock extracts of various source intervals thus coaly biomarker signatures of the oils most likely resulted from mixing and migration contamination when hydrocarbons derived from mature source rocks migrated up through highly fractured coal seams along deep seated faults in addition to conventional exploration targets revised petroleum generation and accumulation models predict that the focus in the turpan basin should also include deep structures within the carboniferous permian strata and subtle low magnitude anticlines and stratigraphic traps within the triassic jurassic sections crown copyright

ice sheets and sea level in the tandem papers on the stability of the antarctic and greenland ice sheets by j t overpeck b l otto bliesner and co workers paleoclimatic evidence for future ice sheet instability and rapid sea level rise j t overpeck et al reports 24 mar p 1747 simulating arctic

an ice marginal δ18o record from barnes ice cap baffin island canada barnes ice cap baffin island canada is a remnant of the laurentide ice sheet that separated from it about 8500 years ago owing to recession of the ice cap during the holocene pleistocene age i

holocene glacial and climatic variations on spitsbergen svalbard holocene glacial and climatic variations have been inferred from investigations of sediment cores from the proglacial lake linnevatnet western spitsbergen a low content of glacially derived coal absence of regular laminations and a slow sedimentation rate in the lower part of the lacustrine sediments indicate that the former glaciers that existed within the catchment area during the last ice age melted quickly away as a result of the younger dryas holocene warming and during the next 6000 years there were no glaciers in the valley increasing coal content incipient laminations and rising sedimentation rates indicate that the glacier linnebreen started to form 4000 5000 years ago probably as a response to the late holocene cooling the holocene maximum extent of the glacier occurred during the little ice age starting with a pronounced ice advance in the thirteenth or fourteenth century a well dated core from billefjorden which is assumed to reflect glacial fluctuations in the inner part of the i

holocene glacier fluctuations a global overview of glacier advances and retreats grouped by regions and by millennia for the holocene is compiled from previous studies the reconstructions of glacier fluctuations are based on 1 mapping and dating moraines defined by 14 c tcn osl lichenometry and tree rings discontinuous records time series and 2 sediments from proglacial lakes and speleothems continuous records time series using 189 continuous and discontinuous time series the long term trends and centennial fluctuations of glaciers were compared to trends in the recession of northern and mountain tree lines and with orbital solar and volcanic studies to examine the likely forcing factors that drove the changes recorded a general trend of increasing glacier size from the earlyemid holocene to the late holocene in the extra tropical areas of the northern hemisphere nh is related to overall summer temperature forced by orbitally controlled insolation the glaciers in new zealand and in the tropical andes also appear to follow the orbital trend i e they were decreasing from the early holocene to the present in contrast glacier fluctuations in some monsoonal areas of asia and southern south america generally did not follow the orbital trends but fluctuated at a higher frequency possibly triggered by distinct teleconnections patterns during the neoglacial advances clustered at 4 4e4 2 ka 3 8e3 4 ka 3 3e2 8 ka 2 6 ka 2 3e2 1 ka 1 5e1 4 ka 1 2e1 0 ka 0 7e0 5 ka corresponding to general cooling periods in the north atlantic some of these episodes coincide with multidecadal periods of low solar activity but it is unclear what mechanism might link small changes in irradiance to widespread glacier fluctuations explosive volcanism may have played a role in some periods of glacier advances such as around 1 7e1 6 ka coinciding with the taupo volcanic eruption at 232 5 ce but the record of explosive volcanism is poorly known through the holocene the compilation of ages suggests that there is no single mechanism driving glacier fluctuations on a global scale multidecadal variations of solar and volcanic activity supported by positive feedbacks in the climate system may have played a critical role in holocene glaciation but further research on such linkages is needed the rate and the global character of glacier retreat in the 20th through early 21st centuries appears unusual in the context of holocene glaciation though the retreating glaciers in most parts of the northern hemisphere are still larger today than they were in the early and or mid holocene the current retreat

simulated petroleum generation studies by hydrous pyrolysis of a tertiary coal from northern cambay basin in india in the northern cambay basin ahmedabad mehsana block abundant coal seams occur at depths of 1000 1700 m the role such coals can play in hydrocarbon hc generation has not been determined hydrocarbon generation from a core sample with a hydrogen index hi 268 mg hc g total organic carbon toc oxygen index oi 19 mg co2 g toc and vitrinite reflectance in oil vro 0 38 has been simulated by hydrous pyrolysis at a temperature of 325 c for 2 10 50 and 100 h it has been observed that generation is in accordance with the model kerogen asphaltenes hydrocarbons the peak oil generation stage is reached at 0 89 vro the peak oil expulsion stage occurs at 0 91 vro although hydrocarbons are generated from 0 75 vro onwards the results indicate that these coals have not contributed towards hydrocarbon reserves of northern cambay basin

comparison of three series of organic matter of continental origin abstract three series of sediments containing land plant derived organic matter were studied they include wells from mahakam delta indonesia miocene douala basin cameroon upper cretaceous and eastern paris basin france paleozoic all of the kerogens and coals isolated from these series can be related to type iii in a van krevelen diagram however they obviously differ in terms of chemical structure as reflected by their pyrolysis gc patterns and by their bitumen composition these observations indicate the variations in the nature of land plant derived sedimentary organic matter and thus differences in quantity and composition of the hydrocarbons which are are released upon maturation based on hydrocarbons potential of the insoluble organic matter and on pyrolysis gc there is no reason to disregard coals and to favor shales as potential source rocks in these two deltaic sequences moreover we assume that the bitumen depletion in coal samples is a reflection of loss by migration which is favored in coals when compared to shales the gc patterns of the residual saturates compared to the pyrolysis gc patterns of the related insoluble coals suggest that migration of hydrocarbons proceeds in these coals without any significant alteration of their distribution at least in the c15 range

coal as a source rock for oil a review the geological debate about whether and to what extent humic coals have sourced oil is likely to continue for some time despite some important advances in our knowledge of the processes involved it is clear that not only liptinites but also perhydrous vitrinites have the potential to generate hydrocarbon liquids in the course of natural coalification some liptinites especially alginite cutinite and suberinite contain a higher proportion of aliphatic moieties in their structure than other liptinites such as sporinite and resinite and are therefore more oil prone it is of potential value to be able to predict the several environments of deposition in which coals with high liptinite contents or containing perhydrous vitrinites may have been formed review of the distribution of oil prone coals in time and space reveals that most are jurassic tertiary with key examples from australia new zealand and indonesia methods based both on experimental simulations and the examination of naturally matured samples have been used to determine the order of generation of hydrocarbons from different macerals results are not entirely consistent among the different approaches and there is much overlap in the ranges of degradation but it seems probable that in the natural environment vitrinites begin to generate early followed by labile liptinites such as suberinite then cutinite sporinite and finally alginite petroleum potential may be determined by experimental simulation of natural coalification or inferred through various micro techniques especially fluorescence and infrared ir spectroscopy or bulk techniques such as elemental analysis and 13c nmr spectroscopy the latter three techniques enable a measure of the polymethylene component of the coal which now appears to be one of the best available approaches for determining petroleum potential no method of experimental simulation of petroleum generation from coals is without criticism and comparative results are highly variable however hydrous pyrolysis confined pyrolysis and forms of open system hydrous pyrolysis approach acceptable simulations whether and to what degree generated liquid hydrocarbons are expelled has long been the central problem in oil from coal studies the structure of vitrinite was believed until recently to contain an interconnected microporous network in which generated oil would be contained until an expulsion threshold was attained recent studies show the pores are not interconnected combined with a dynamic model of pore generation it now seems that expulsion of hydrocarbons is best explained by activated diffusion of molecules to maceral boundaries and ultimately by cleats and fractures to coal seam boundaries the main reason for poor expulsion is the adsorption of oil on the organic macromolecule which may be overcome 1 if coals are thin and interbedded with clastic sediments or 2 if the coals are very hydrogen rich and generate large quantities of oil the existence of oil in vitrinite is attested to by solvent extractions fluorescence properties and by microscopic observations of oil and bitumen experimental simulation of expulsion of oil from coals has only recently been attempted the relative timing of release of generated co2 and ch4 could have considerable importance in promoting the expulsion of liquid hydrocarbons but the mechanism is unclear as it is universally agreed that dispersed organic matter dom in some shales readily generates and expels petroleum it is curious that few consistent geochemical differences have been found between coal macerals and dom in interbedded shales unambiguous evidence of expulsion from coals is limited and in particular only a few commercial oil discoveries can be confidently correlated to coals these include upper cretaceous fruitland formation coals in the usa from which oil is produced new zealand tertiary coals and middle jurassic coals from the danish north sea it is likely that coals have at least contributed to significant oil discoveries in the gippsland basin australia in the turpan basin china and in the kutei and ardjuna basins in indonesia but this remains unproven early reports that early jurassic coals in mid norway were a major source of the reservoired oils have been shown to be inaccurate none of the proposed rules of thumb for generation or expulsion of petroleum from coals seem particularly robust decisions on whether a particular coal is likely to have been an active source for oil should consider all available geological and geochemical information the assumptions made in computational models should be well understood as it is likely with new understandings of processes involved that some of these assumptions will be difficult to sustain

early cenozoic two phase extension and late cenozoic thermal subsidence and inversion of the bohai basin northern china abstract the bohai basin is one of a family of early cenozoic extensional basins that lie along the eastern margin of asia from russia to vietnam initial extension was probably triggered by subduction roll back of the oceanic pacific plate from the asian continent there were two phases in the bohai basin s rift history the earlier paleocene early eocene phase resulted in the deposition of the kongdian formation and the fourth lowest member of the shahejie formation in a series of elongate half grabens these half grabens have master faults with a nne ssw orientation secondary normal faults are typically clockwise oblique to the master faults indicating a component of dextral transtension deposition was focused in the west and south of the present basin these rocks are mainly alluvial fan and fluvial red beds the architecture of the basin underwent an important change at ca 43 45 ma middle eocene beginning with the deposition of the third member of the shahejie formation in part these sediments were deposited in the same half grabens as the kongdian formation but the bozhong depression in the central part of the basin originated at this time and became the major depocentre the bozhong depression superficially resembles a pull apart basin it formed when continued transtension of the earlier tertiary fault systems to the east and west created an extensional overlap between them during this phase the basin as a whole had a geometry with elements typical of both pull apart and transtensional basins regional extension in many east asian basins ended at the end of the oligocene probably because of the onset of transpression within eastern asia caused by the collision of australia with the philippine sea plate dextral transpression caused minor inversion of some of the earlier normal faults in bohai but as a whole the basin began to subside in a post rift phase of thermal subsidence that has lasted until the present day

organic geochemical characteristics and depositional environment of the tertiary tanjong formation coals in the pinangah area onshore sabah malaysia article i nfo article history the tertiary tanjong formation coals exposed in the west middle block of the pinangah coalfield central part of southern sabah were analyzed and their depositional environments were interpreted the tertiary tanjong coals are humic and generally dominated by vitrinite with significant amounts of liptinite and low amounts of inertinite macerals total organic carbon contents toc of the coals range from 51 2 to 77 7 wt and yield of bitumen values ranging from 57 300 to 140 000 ppm which meet the standard as a source rock with good hydrocarbon generative potential in support good liquid hydrocarbons generation potential can be expected from the tanjong coals based on significant liptinitic content 15 this is supported by their high hydrogen index up to 300 mg hc g toc consistent with type ii and mixed type ii iii kerogens and py gc s2 pyrograms with n alkane alkene doublets extending beyond c30 the coal samples have vitrinite reflectance values in the range of 0 42 0 66 ro indicating immature to early mature stage for hydrocarbon generation these vitrinite reflectance values also indicated that the tanjong coals are with sub bituminous b a and high volatile bituminous c rank tmax values ranging from 419 to 451 c are good agreement with the vitrinite reflectance data this is supported by biomarker maturity parameters as suggested by the c32 homohopane the saturated fraction of the tanjong coals are characterized by dominant odd carbon numbered n alkanes n c23 to n c33 high pr ph ratios 8 18 high tm ts ratios 6 28 and pre dominant of regular sterane c29 all biomarker parameters clearly indicate that the organic matter was de rived from terrestrial inputs and deposited under oxic condition

setting a chronology for the basal ice at dye 3 and grip implications for the long term stability of the greenland ice sheet abstract the long term stability of the greenland ice sheet gis is an important issue in our understanding of the climate system limited data suggest that the northern and southern sections extend well back into the pleistocene but most age constraints do not definitively date the ice here we re examine the grip and dye 3 ice cores to provide direct ice core observations as to whether the gis survived previous interglacials known to be warmer 130 ka or longer 430 ka than the present interglacial we present geochemical analyses of the basal ice from dye 3 1991 2035 m and grip 3020 3026 m that characterize and date the ice we analyzed the elemental and isotopic composition of o2 n2 and ar of trapped air in these two cores to assess the origin of trapped gases in silty ice dating of the trapped air was then achieved by measuring the paleoatmospheric 40ar 38ar and the 17o anomaly 17 of o2 the resulting age is a lower limit because the trapped air may be contaminated with crustal radiogenic 40ar the oldest average age of replicates measured at various depths is 970 140 ka for the grip ice core and 400 ka 170 ka for dye 3 17 data from dye 3 also argue strongly that basal ice in this core predates the eemian this confirms that the greenland ice sheet did not completely melt at southern greenland during the last interglacial nor did it completely melt at summit greenland during the unusually long interglacial 430 kyr before present

the silidor deposit rouyn noranda district abitibi belt geology structural evolution and paleostress modeling of an au quartz vein type deposit in an archean trondhjemite late orogenic gold bearing quartz vein deposits within the rouyn noranda mining district occur mainly within archean tonalitic plutons of the blake river group southern abitibi belt the silidor deposit is a representative example of a pluton hosted lode gold deposit the silidor mine contained 2 95 million tons mt mined and estimated reserves grading 5 1 g t au 15 t au the mineralized zone is 900 m in length and has a vertical extent of 900 m an average thickness of 3 5 m and trends northwest southeast with a dip of 50 to 70 ne its alteration envelope consists of a red hematite altered trondhjemite measured 18 o values for quartz veins 7 7 10 9 and 34 s values for pyrite 6 1 to 9 4 imply oxidizing conditions during gold deposition the mineralized zone comprises vein quartz white gray and smoky varieties beige mineralized trondhjemite and green carbonate sericite fuchsite breccia which resulted from shearing and metasomatism of an early northwest southeast dioritic dike a quantitative microtectonic study 400 measurements was carried out on the powell tonalitic sill in the silidor mine area to reconstruct the deformation before during and after the mineralizing events the reduced stress tensors display large variations in 1 orientation trending successively northwest southeast northeast southwest and finally north south the silidor deposit is the result of several vein filling events which occurred during evolution from strike slip faulting to reverse faulting regimes with 1 remaining northeast southwest but with exchange of orientation of 2 and 3 such variations may reflect an oblique collision and processes of stress permutation paleostress mapping of archean terranes can be used as a targeting tool for mesothermal lode gold deposits reduced stress tensors were used for the computation of paleostress maps using a distinct element model the silidor au quartz mineralization appears on these paleostress maps in an area characterized by low mean stress throughout the deformation history of the area near the horne creek fault this study emphasizes the role of second order faulting in the location of low and high pressure zones in the archean crust and the possible role of a tectonic indentor in the location of au mineralization

some comments on climatic reconstructions from ice cores drilled in areas of high melt poor consideration has been given in many arctic circum polar ice core studies to the effect of summer snow melt on chemistry stable isotope concentrations and time scales many of these corps are drilled close to the firn line where melt is intense some come from below the firn line where accumulation is solely in the form of super imposed ice in all cases seasonal signals are reduced or removed and in some time gaps develop during periods of excessive melting which situate the drill site in the ablation zone consequently cross correlations of assumed synchronous events among the cores are invalid so that time scales along the same cores differ between authors by factors of over 2 many so called climatic signals are imaginary rather than real by reference to published analyses of cores from the superimposed ice zone on devon ice cap koerner 1970 and meighen ice cap koerner and paterson 1974 it is shown how melt affects all the normally well established ice core proxies and leads to their misinterpretation despite these limitations the cores can give valuable low resolution records for all or part of the holocene they show that the thermal maximum in the circum polar arctic occurred in the early holocene this maximum effected negative balances on all the ice caps and removed the smaller ones cooler conditions in the second half of the holocene have caused the regrowth of these same ice caps

penny ice cap cores baffin island canada and the wisconsinan foxe dome connection two states of hudson bay ice cover ice cores from penny ice cap baffin island canada provide continuous holocene records of oxygen isotopic composition 18 o proxy for temperature and atmospheric impurities a time scale was established with the use of altered seasonal variations some volcanic horizons and the age for the end of the wisconsin ice age determined from the grip and gisp2 ice cores there is pre holocene ice near the bed the change in 18 o since the last glacial maximum lgm is at least 12 5 per mil compared with an expected value of 7 per mil suggesting that lgm ice originated at the much higher elevations of the then existing foxe dome and foxe ridge of the laurentide ice sheet the lgm 18 o values suggest thick ice frozen to the bed of hudson bay

controls on the oil and gas potential of humic coals abstract humic coals are highly heterogeneous both with respect to maceral content and chemical composition although the oldest known humic coals albeit gas prone are of devonian age the majority of humic coals capable of generating and expelling non volatile oil are of cretaceous and tertiary age from australia new zealand and southeast asia in contrast the middle jurassic humic coals of the sleipner and hugin formations in the south viking graben of the north sea are primarily gasprone but have the capability to expel aliphatic rich volatile oil these coals have toc contents up to 80 and hydrogen indices hi ranging from 200 to 400 they are vitrinite rich with some containing up to 45 inertinite liptinite concentrations are generally around 10 20 chiefly as spores pollen and abundant resinite the main control on the oil potential of humic coals is the concentration of long chain aliphatic hydrocarbons in the coal matrix although the aliphatics have a high h c ratio the inference on hydrogen content from the rock eval pyrolysis hi value can be misleading for hi values below 500 mg hc g oc there is no relation between hi and the potential of the coals to generate non volatile oil consequently the hi is a poor indicator of the non volatile oil potential of humic coals a more robust indicator is the relative amount of c8 aliphatic groups also the bulk measure of liptinite content may also prove misleading when assessing the oil potential of coals high resinite concentrations can lead to an overprediction of the non volatile oil potential as they contribute significantly to the hi value but will generate primarily volatile aromatic rich oils expulsion from the sleipner and hugin coals appears to have occurred in a gaseous phase with preferential release of short chain alkanes

comparison between greenland ice margin an ice core oxygen 18 records old ice for paleoenvironmental studies retrieved by deep core drilling in the central regions of the big ice sheets can also be retrieved from the ice sheet margins the d18o content of the surface ice was studied at 15 different greenland ice margin locations at some locations two or more records were obtained along closely spaced parallel sampling profiles showing good reproducibility of the records we present ice margin d18o records reaching back into the pleistocene many of the characteristic d18o variations known from greenland deep ice cores can be recognized allowing an approximate time scale to be established along the ice margin records a flow line model is used to determine the location on the ice sheet where the margin ice was originally deposited as snow the pleistocene holocene d18o change at the deposition sites is determined by comparing the d18o values in the ice margin record to the present 18o values of the surface snow at the deposition sites on the northern slope of the greenland ice sheet the pleistocene holocene d18o change is c 10 per mil in contrast to a change of 6 7 per mil at locations near the central ice divide this is in accordance with deep ice core results we conclude that d18o records measured on ice from the greenland ice sheet margin provide useful information about past climate and dynamics of the ice sheet and thus are important and cheap supplements to deep ice core records

hydrocarbon potential of pennsylvanian coal in bohai gulf basin eastern china as revealed by hydrous pyrolysis abstract a hydrous pyrolysis experiment was performed using pennsylvanian brown coal with a vitrinite reflectance vr 0 of 0 56 from a coal mine at the southwest corner of the bohai gulf basin eastern china to evaluate the hydrocarbon potential of the coal the coal sample is vitrinite rich 74 5 and inertinite poor 16 7 with liptinite content of 8 8 much of the vitrinite in the sample consists of hydrogen rich vitrinite collodetrinite hydrous pyrolysis was performed at 200 c 230 c 260 c 290 c 320 c and 350 c for 72 h separately yields of both total liquid pyrolysates and expelled oil increased with temperature before reaching their maximum production of 17 27 kg t coal and 14 57 kg t coal at the same temperature of 320 c vr 0 1 18 and decreased afterwards gaseous products increased sharply at 320 c and tended to increase even at the highest experimental temperature 350 c vr 0 1 53 results show that the coal has not only a certain oil generation potential but also a large capacity for gas production and a high expulsion efficiency oil potential of the coal is attributed to its depositional environment which was transitional from shallow marine to coastal plain or swamp during middle to late pennsylvanian the coal was protected from oxidation under water after deposition experimental results indicate that this pennsylvanian coal could have contributed to oil gas accumulation in the bohai gulf basin

significance of coniferous rain forests and related organic matter in generating commercial quantities of oil gippsland basin australia contrary to the conventional belief that humic coal generates primarily gas 3 billion bbl of recoverable oil has been discovered in the humic coaly succession of the fluviodeltaic latrobe group upper cretaceous tertiary that serves as both the reservoir and the source for hydrocarbons in the offshore gippsland basin of southeastern australia evidence for generation of liquid hydrocarbons from the coaly succession includes 1 similarity of n alkane distribution in the oil and in the coal extracts 2 high wax content of oil up to 27 by weight 3 high ratio of pristane phytane in oil 5 6 and 4 dominance of c29 steranes in the oil in the gippsland basin coniferous rain forests dominated by kauri vegetation flourished in a raised bog setting present temperate climate and kauri vegetation of new zealand are considered to be the modern analog to the gippsland basin the coniferous vegetation provided large quantities of hydrogen rich exinite macerals such as cutinite and resinite with potential to generate oil high rainfall raised ground water level low oxygen high acidity and low nutrient conditions of a raised bog setting were suitable for preserving organic matter a comparison of gas chromatograms of oils in the gippsland basin with gas chromatograms of oils generated by hydrous pyrolysis in the laboratory from the immature source rocks suggests that the paraffinic fraction of the oil was derived from coal and the naphthenic fraction was derived chiefly from resin

new insights on the green river petroleum system in the uinta basin from hydrous pyrolysis experiments the tertiary green river petroleum system in the uinta basin generated about 500 million bbl of recoverable high pour point paraffinic crude oil from lacustrine source rocks a prolific complex of marginal and open lacustrine source rocks dominated by carbonate oil shales containing up to 60 wt type i kerogen occur within distinct stratigraphic units in the basin petroleum generation is interpreted to originate from source pods in the basal green river formation buried to depths greater than 3000 m along the steeply dipping northern margin of the basin producing fields in the altamont bluebell trend have elevated pore fluid pressures approaching 80 of lithostatic pressure and are completed in strata where open fractures provide permeability active hydrocarbon generation is one explanation for the origin of the overpressured reservoirs in this study experiments were undertaken to examine the mechanisms of hydrocarbon generation and accumulation in the uinta basin we combined analyses of representative source rocks from the entire green river stratigraphic section with detailed laboratory simulation experiments using both open and closed system pyrolysis this information provides new insights on lacustrine source rock lithofacies gas oil source rock correlations hydrocarbon generation kinetics and basin modeling the results show that the basal green river formation contains a unique type i source facies responsible for generation of paraffinic crude oils the classic type i oil shales in the upper green river formation correlate well with low maturity aromatic asphaltic samples we determined kinetic parameters for the source rocks and used them to develop basin models for hydrocarbon generation the models show that hydrous pyrolysis kinetic parameters are more consistent with the natural data in terms of predicted timing and extent of oil generation as compared to models using rock eval kinetics begin page 1334

using ice cores and gaussian process emulation to recover changes in the greenland ice sheet during the last interglacial the shape and extent of the greenland ice sheet gis during the last interglacial lig is a matter of controversy with different studies proposing a wide range of reconstructions here for the first time we combine stable water isotopic information from ice cores with isotope enabled climate model outputs to investigate the problem exploring the space of possible ice sheet geometries by simulation is prohibitively expensive we address this problem by using a gaussian process emulator as a statistical surrogate of the full climate model the emulator is calibrated using the results of a small number of carefully chosen simulations and then permits fast probabilistic predictions of the simulator outputs at untried inputs the inputs are gis morphologies parameterised through a dimension reduction technique adapted to the spherical geometry of the setting based on the emulator predictions the characteristics of morphologies compatible with the available ice core measurements are explored leading to a reduction in uncertainty on the lig gis morphology moreover a scenario based approach allows to assess the gains in uncertainty reduction which would result from the availability of better dated lig measurements in greenland ice cores

hydrocarbon generation from deltaic and intermontane fluviodeltaic coal and coaly shale from the tertiary of texas and carboniferous of nova scotia abstract selected samples of coal and coaly shale from southeastern texas depositional environment deltaic age paleocene eocene ro 0 25 0 75 and nova scotia depositional environment intermontane swamp delta and lacustrine age carboniferous westphalian a d ro 0 67 0 70 were analyzed by fluorescence microscopy rock eval pyrolysis nmr anhydrous pyrolysis temperature programed and flash and hydrous pyrolysis to evaluate the hydrocarbon potential and hydrocarbon types based on maceral assemblages palynofacies and hydrocarbon potential these coal and coaly shale samples are classified as humic mixinitic mixed and sapropelic compared to humic and sapropelic as defined by stach et al coal petrology gebruder borntraeger berlin 1982 mixinitic or mixed coal and coaly shale containing mainly humodetrinite and lipodetrinite generated more than 10 pyrolysate expelled oil oil in wash fraction remaining coal extract and show a bimodal n alkane distribution derived from cutinite suberinite and alginite pyrolysis of humotelinite humocollinite rich and liptinite poor humic coals generated low amounts

petroleum source rock assessment in non marine sequences pyrolysis and petrographic analysis of australian coals and carbonaceous shales a series of australian coals and terrestrial sediments ranging in age from permian through tertiary have been analyzed to assess their petroleum source character and the suitability of various techniques for assessment of source rock potential in non marine sequences the procedures used include organic petrography rock eval pyrolysis elemental analysis and quantitative pyrolysis gas chromatography the latter procedure was used to assess the potential yield of paraffins which is critical to the assessment of most non marine source rocks principal components analysis was used to assist in the analysis of the data although the petroleum potential of the samples follows the broad trends in petrographic composition established for australian coals i e relative proportions of vitrinite inertinite and liptinite there is much variation which cannot be explained petrographically at the maceral group level further pyrolytic hydrocarbon yield is not related to overall elemental composition below an atomic h c ratio of 1 0 the yield of phenols in flash pyrolysis is related to depositional setting as well as degree of maturation the yield and carbon number distribution of normal hydrocarbons in flash pyrolysis varied widely depending on the age nature and amount of liptinite macerals particularly in samples with hydrogen indices below 300 liptinite poor 10 samples may yield significant amounts of hydrocarbons but typically they have a low wax content sporinite rich and liptodetrinite rich samples give lower yields of normal hydrocarbons these are predominantly of lower molecular weight suberinite and to a lesser extent cutinite are associated with high yields of waxy normal hydrocarbons but some samples with high yields did not contain large amounts of these maceral the correlation of tmax to vitrinite reflectance varies with petrographic composition the results have implications for the way source rock analyses are conducted and interpreted in non marine sequences

reconstruction of the glacial ice covers of greenland and the canadian arctic islands by three dimensional perfectly plastic ice sheet modelling a three dimensional perfectly plastic ice sheet model developed for determining the surface elevations and the flow pattern of an ice sheet with given bottom topography and ice margin positions is applied to the reconstruction of the glacial ice covers of greenland and the canadian arctic islands in the northern regions two different reconstructions have been performed with ice margins along the present 600 and 200 m sea depth contours respectively in central greenland the ice margin is considered to be at the outermost ice margin deposits on the coastal shelf to the west and at the present 200 m sea depth contour to the east the main conclusions to be drawn from the reconstructions are 1 the flow pattern of the glacial ice cover of greenland shows a great resemblance to the present one the central ice divide being displaced less than 50 km from its present position and being no more than 200 m higher than today 2 the main ice divide of the ice sheet covering the canadian arctic islands the innuitian ice sheet was located over the highlands of eastern ellesmere island with local domes positioned over the present ice caps indicating that even the deep ice of wisconsin age in these ice caps is of local origin this is also the case for the devon island ice cap 3 even in the not very likely case of a rather extensive glacial ice cover in north west greenland the ice flow pattern upstream of the camp century deep drill site would not have changed radically compared to the present flow pattern thus it is concluded that even advanced ice margins in late wisconsin time could at most have resulted in an elevation of the deposition site of the late wisconsin ice at camp century 600 m higher than at present the consequences of this conclusion are discussed

a study of natural gas origins in china the chinese government has supported the development of the natural gas industry since the sixth five year plan 1981 1985 by studying natural gas and its origin one of the key research projects in technology and science this ongoing research has shown that natural gases in china are composed of three types coal type gas related to coal measures high temperature pyrolytic gas related to paleozoic carbonates and oil type gas which occurs in oil fields related to cenozoic and mesozoic lacustrine sediments each of these three types constitutes about one third of the total observed reserves of natural gas in china since 1990 we have proposed a new genetic theory of natural gas multisource overlap and multistage continuity a new biogenic thermocatalytic transition l zone gas and comprehensively identifying coal type gas which plays an important role in exploring for natural gas

hydrocarbon genesis of jurassic coal measures in the turpan basin china abstract a typical case of coal derived oils in china i e the crude oils from the middle lower jurassic coal measure strata in the turpan basin is presented by means of oil source correlation it is confirmed that low maturity crude oil in the shengjinkou oil field is derived from the coal bearing qiketai formation of middle jurassic age a brackish lacustrine sediment mature crude oils in the qiketai oil field and in well taican 1 are sourced from the badaowan formation of lower jurassic age which contains coal seams as thick as 100 m results show that commercial accumulations of liquid crude oils can be generated from coals and coal measure strata containing high volatile coal of bituminous rank despite unfavourable types of source material the total hydrocarbon generating potential can be great due to the unusual abundance of organic matter

on the nature of the dirty ice at the bottom of the gisp2 ice core abstract we present data on the triple ar isotope composition in trapped gas from clean stratigraphically disturbed ice between 2800 and 3040 m depth in the gisp2 ice core and from basal dirty ice from 3040 to 3053 m depth we also present data for the abundance and isotopic composition of o2 and n2 and abundance of ar in the basal dirty ice the ar n2 ratio of dirty basal ice the heavy isotope enrichment reflecting gravitational fractionation and the total gas content all indicate that the gases in basal dirty ice originate from the assimilation of clean ice of the overlying glacier which comprises most of the ice in the dirty bottom layer o2 is partly to completely depleted in basal ice reflecting active metabolism the gravitationally corrected ratio of 40ar 38ar which decreases with age in the global atmosphere is compatible with an age of 100 250 ka for clean disturbed ice in basal ice 40ar is present in excess due to injection of radiogenic 40ar produced in the underlying continental crust the weak depth gradient of 40ar in the dirty basal ice and the distribution of dirt indicate mixing within the basal ice while various published lines of evidence indicate mixing within the overlying clean disturbed ice excess ch4 which reaches thousands of ppm in basal dirty ice at grip is virtually absent in overlying clean disturbed ice demonstrating that mixing of dirty basal ice into the overlying clean ice if it occurs at all is very slow order of magnitude estimates indicate that the mixing rate of clean ice into dirty ice is sufficient to maintain a steady thickness of dirty ice against thinning from the mean ice flow the dirty ice appears to consist of two or more basal components in addition to clean glacial ice a small amount of soil or permafrost plus preglacial snow lake or ground ice could explain the observations

the δ18o record along the greenland ice core project deep ice core and the problem of possible eemian climatic instability over 70 000 samples from the 3029 m long greenland ice core project grip ice core drilled on the top of the greenland ice sheet summit have been analyzed for 8o a highly detailed and continuous 8o profile has thus been obtained and is discussed in terms of past temperatures in greenland we also discuss a three core stacked annual 8o profile for the past 917 years the short term 50 years variability of the annual 8o signal is found to be 1 in the holocene and estimates for the coldest parts of the last glacial are 3 or higher these data also provide insights into possible disturbances of the stratigraphic layering in the core which seems to be sound down to the onset of the eemian spectral analysis of highly detailed sequences of the profile helps determine the smoothing of the 8o signal which for the holocene ice is found to be considerably stronger than expected we suggest this is due to a process involving diffusion of water molecules along crystal boundaries in the recrystallizing ice matrix deconvolution techniques were employed for restoring with great confidence the highly attenuated annual 8o signal in the holocene we confirm earlier findings of dramatic temperature changes in greenland during the last glacial cycle abrupt and strong climatic shifts are also found within the eem sangamon interglaciation which is normally recorded as a period of warm and stable climate in lower latitudes the stratigraphic continuity of the eemian layers is consequently discussed in section 3 of this paper in terms of all pertinent data which we are not able to reconcile

last interglacial arctic warmth confirms polar amplification of climate change the warmest millennia of at least the past 250 000 years occurred during the last interglaciation when global ice volumes were similar to or smaller than today and systematic variations in earth s orbital parameters aligned to produce a strong positive summer insolation anomaly throughout the northern hemisphere the average insolation during the key summer months m j j was ca 11 above present across the northern hemisphere between 130 000 and 127 000 years ago with a slightly greater anomaly 13 over the arctic greater summer insolation early penultimate deglaciation and intensification of the north atlantic drift combined to reduce arctic ocean sea ice allow expansion of boreal forest to the arctic ocean shore across vast regions reduce permafrost and melt almost all glaciers in the northern hemisphere insolation amplified by key boundary condition feedbacks collectively produced last interglacial summer temperature anomalies 4 5 c above present over most arctic lands significantly above the average northern hemisphere anomaly the last interglaciation demonstrates the strength of positive feedbacks on arctic warming and provides a potentially conservative analogue for anticipated future greenhouse warming

variation in pyrolysate composition of sediments from the jurassic walloon coal measures eastern australia as a function of thermal maturation examination of a natural maturity sequence from the jurassic walloon coal measures by quantitative flash pyrolysis gas chromatography py gc and low temperature sealed tube pyrolysis reveals systematic changes in pyrolysate composition in particular gas to oil ratios composition of gas and liquid normal hydrocarbons aromatic and heteroatom content are examined for this immature oil prone rock as it is taken artificially and naturally through the oil window liquid hydrocarbon generation giving a product with a high wax content is shown to occur over a relatively narrow range of maturation significant quantities of gas are generated and the gas to oil ratio remains relatively constant during the main phase of oil generation this reflects a uniform distribution of oil and gas precursors in the original labile kerogen at higher rank where increasing generation from the residual refractory kerogen occurs there is a progressive decrease in the yield of liquid hydrocarbons concomitant with an increase in the gas to oil ratio

statistical determination of geochemical parameters of coal and kerogen macerals from transmission micro infrared spectroscopy data abstract a set of samples including type i and type ii kerogens and coals type iii as well as two series of artificially oxidized and matured coals were analyzed by fourier transform infrared spectroscopy ftir major infrared bands aliphatic and aromatic ch c o and c c were integrated in order to draw correlations with geochemical parameters obtained on bulk powdered samples rock eval hi h c o h and o c atomic ratios coal macerals bituminite resinite vitrinite megaspores and torbanite components algal bodies and matrix were characterized by in situ micro infrared spectroscopy the correlations derived from ftir analysis of bulk samples were used to deduce the geochemical parameters of coal and kerogen macerals from their micro infrared characteristics results indicate that h c atomic ratios and rock eval hydrogen indices exhibit good correlations 0 9 fa 2860 cm 1 2860 cm 1 1600 cm 1 and chali infrared parameters that allow the hi and h c of single macerals to be calculated however a significant scattering of the data points around the regression line is observed when using large sets of samples correlations were recalculated on a limited series of oxidized coals in order to improve their quality the derived equations facilitate the determination of the evolution of hi as well as h c and o c atomic ratios of different coal macerals during artificial oxidation results are compared to the recomputed data on coal deduced from both the micro infrared analysis of macerals and the maceral composition of coal

the petroleum generation potential and effective oil window of humic coals related to coal composition and age abstract a worldwide data set of more than 500 humic coals from the major coal forming geological periods has been used to analyse the evolution in the remaining hydrogen index hi and total quality index qi generation potentials with increasing thermal maturity and the effective oil window oil expulsion window all samples describe hi and qi bands that are broad at low maturities and that gradually narrow with increasing maturity the oil generation potential is completely exhausted at a vitrinite reflectance of 2 0 2 2 ro or tmax of 500 510 c the initial large variation in the generation potential is related to the original depositional conditions particularly the degree of marine influence and the formation of hydrogen enriched vitrinite as suggested by increased sulphur and hydrogen contents during initial thermal maturation the hi increases to a maximum value himax similarly qi increases to a maximum value qimax this increase in hi and qi is related to the formation of an additional generation potential in the coal structure the decline in qi with further maturation is indicating onset of initial oil expulsion which precedes efficient expulsion liquid petroleum generation from humic coals is thus a complex three phase process i onset of petroleum generation ii petroleum build up in the coal and iii initial oil expulsion followed by efficient oil expulsion corresponding to the effective oil window efficient oil expulsion is indicated by a decline in the bitumen index bi when plotted against vitrinite reflectance or tmax this means that in humic coals the vitrinite reflectance or tmax values at which onset of petroleum generation occurs cannot be used to establish the start of the effective oil window the start of the effective oil window occurs within the vitrinite reflectance range 0 85 1 05 ro or tmax range 440 455 c and the oil window extends to 1 5 2 0 ro or 470 510 c for general use an effective oil window is proposed to occur from 0 85 to 1 7 ro or from 440 to 490 c specific ranges for himax and the effective oil window can be defined for cenozoic jurassic permian and carboniferous coals cenozoic coals reach the highest himax values 220 370 mg hc g toc and for the most oil prone cenozoic coals the effective oil window may possibly range from 0 65 to 2 0 ro or 430 to 510 c in contrast the most oil prone jurassic permian and carboniferous coals reach the expulsion threshold at a vitrinite reflectance of 0 85 0 9 ro or tmax of 440 445 c

10be in the akademii nauk ice core first results for ce 1590 1950 and implications for future chronology validation temporal variations of the radionuclide 10be are broadly synchronous across the globe and thus provide a powerful tool to synchronize ice core chronologies from different locations we compared the 10be record of the akademii nauk an ice core russian arctic for the time period ce 1590 1950 to the 10be records of two well dated greenland ice cores dye3 and ngrip a high correlation r 0 59 was found between the an and dye3 records whereas the correlation with ngrip was distinctly lower r 0 45 sources of deviations may include local fluctuations in the deposition of 10be due to changes in the precipitation patterns and artefacts due to the core sampling strategy in general the existing age model was validated confirming the an ice core to be a unique and welldated source of palaeoclimate parameters for the russian arctic we further used numerical simulations to test the influence of the core sampling strategy on the results and derived an optimized sampling strategy for the deeper parts of the ice core

ch4 and δ18o of o2 records from antarctic and greenland ice a clue for stratigraphic disturbance in the bottom part of the greenland ice core project and the greenland ice sheet project 2 ice cores the suggestion of climatic instability during the last interglacial period eem based on the bottom 10 of the greenland ice core project grip isotopic profile has been questioned because the bottom record from the neighboring greenland ice sheet project 2 gisp2 core 28 km away is strikingly different over the same interval and because records of the 18o of atmospheric o2 from both cores showed unexpected rapid fluctuations here we present detailed methane records from the vostok antarctica grip and gisp2 cores over the relevant intervals the grip and gisp2 data show rapid and large changes in methane concentration which are correlative with variations of the 18o of the ice while the vostok record shows no such variations this discrepancy reinforces the suggestion that the bottom sections of the greenland records are disturbed by combining the methane data with measurements of 18o of o2 in the same samples we attempt to constrain the nature of the stratigraphic disturbance and the age of the analyzed ice samples our results suggest that ice layers from part of the last interglacial period exist in the lower section of both ice cores and that some of the apparent climate instabilities in the grip core would be the result of a mixture of ice from the last interglacial with ice from the beginning of the last glaciation or from the penultimate glaciation

evaluation of petroleum generation from resinites by hydrous pyrolysis hydrous pyrolysis experiments are useful in evaluating the composition yield and kinetics of liquid hydrocarbons generated from potential source rocks using this technique on a representative set of resinites revealed that fossil resin does not generate a light naphthenic crude oil gas chromatograms of liquid hydrocarbons generated by resinites are dominated by aromatic peaks and show no resemblance to commercially produced crude oils resinites may make minor contributions to conventionally sourced crude oils but their limited occurrence inhibits their potential as a prolific source of petroleum on a basinal scale data from the natural system and pyrolysis experiments also indicate that resinites do not generate liquid hydrocarbons at abnormally low levels of therm l maturity

compound specific stable carbon isotope analysis as a tool for correlating coal sourced oils and interbedded shale sourced oils in coal measures an example from turpan basin north western china molecular geochemical methods have shown that it is often diacult to diaerentiate between coal and interbedded shale sourced oils even though coals and interbedded shales may exhibit considerable organic influx variation e g land plant vs algal organic matter due to the changes of depositional setting however compound specific stable carbon isotopic compositions are sensitive to the source input variations typically specific molecules are more depleted in 13 c with increasing content of aqueous biota this hypothesis is examined and exemplified by comparing the stable carbon isotopic ratios of n alkanes from source rock extracts and related oils of the turpan basin northwestern china stable carbon isotopic values of n alkanes extracted from coals and interbedded shales show that d 13 c values of n alkanes with less than 20 carbon atoms vary only slightly however there are dramatic changes in the isotopic compositions of higher molecular weight n alkanes furthermore n alkanes from coal extracts are enriched in 13 c relative to that of interbedded shales with excursions up to 2 3 this comparison enables the diaerentiation of coal and interbedded shale sourced oils and provides information useful in assessing the hydrocarbon system of a basin 2000 elsevier science ltd all rights reserved

geological characteristics and distribution patterns of hydrocarbon deposits in the bohai bay basin east china abstract the bohai bay basin in east china is a meso cenozoic continental fault bounded basin with abundant petroleum resources based on analyses of sedimentation history and tectonic and thermal evolution the vertical and horizontal distribution patterns of oil and gas are discussed in this paper the basin has characteristics of multiple cycles of depression and uplift and each depression has its own sedimentary system and pattern of oil generation the main source rocks are of lower tertiary sediments characterized by multi cyclic sedimentation multiple source reservoir caprock associations were developed abrupt changes of sedimentary facies and the development of numerous faults caused the formation of various types of oil and gas reservoir that constituted multiple oil and gas accumulation zones based on individual structure zones these accumulation zones are mainly distributed around the centre of source rock deposits and are restricted in the areas where source rocks are distributed

history of the greenland ice sheet paleoclimatic insights abstract paleoclimatic records show that the greenland ice sheet consistently has lost mass in response to warming and grown in response to cooling such changes have occurred even at times of slow or zero sea level change so changing sea level cannot have been the cause of at least some of the ice sheet changes in contrast there are no documented major ice sheet changes that occurred independent of temperature changes moreover snowfall has increased when the climate warmed but the ice sheet lost mass nonetheless increased accumulation in the ice sheet s center has not been sufficient to counteract increased melting and flow near the edges most documented forcings and ice sheet responses spanned periods of several thousand years but limited data also show rapid response to rapid forcings in particular regions near the ice margin have responded within decades however major changes of central regions of the ice sheet are thought to require centuries to millennia the paleoclimatic record does not yet strongly constrain how rapidly a major shrinkage or nearly complete loss of the ice sheet could occur the evidence suggests nearly total ice sheet loss may result from warming of more than a few degrees above mean 20th century values but this threshold is poorly defined perhaps as little as 2 c or more than 7 c paleoclimatic records are sufficiently sketchy that the ice sheet may have grown temporarily in response to warming or changes may have been induced by factors other than temperature without having been recorded

evidence from north west canada for an early holocene milankovitch thermal maximum according to the milankovitch theory of global climatic change maximum summer solar radiation at high latitudes of the northern hemisphere occurred at 10 000 yr bp refs 1 2 in particular it predicts summer solstice radiation greater by 9 10 preliminary climate simulation experiments with these increased values of radiation confirm that high latitude land surfaces received maximal insolation at 10 000 yr refs 3 4 paradoxically however the large volume of fossil pollen and other evidence from north america indicates a maximum of holocene warmth at 7 000 6 000 yr ref 5 and a recent review of the evidence from new england suggests that the warming began at 9 000 and ended at 5 000 yr but also stresses the difficulties of interpretation in terms of climate change6 we summarize here data from sites in the north west corner of mainland canada fig 1 that directly support the milankovitch hypothesis

oxygen 18 16 variability in greenland snow and ice with 10 3 to 105 year time resolution the 3 km long greenland ice sheet project 2 gisp2 ice core presents a 100 000 year detailed oxygen isotope profile covering almost a full glacial interglacial cycle measuranents of isotopic fluctuations in snow frost and atmospheric water vapor samples collected during summer field seasons up to 20 0 are compatible with the large and abrupt 80 160 changes observed in accumulated tim snow pit 15 80 profiles from the gisp2 summit area however show rapid smoothing of the 180 160 signal near the surface beyond about 2 m depth the smoothedi5180 signal is fairly well preserved and can be interpreted in terms of average local weather conditions and climate the longer climate fluctuations also have regional and often global significance in the older part of the record corresponding to marine isotope stages mis 5a to 5d the effect of orbital climate forcing via the 19 and 23 kyr precession cycles and the 41 kyr obliquity cycle is obvious from the end ofmis 5a at about 75 000 years b p till the end of the glacial at the younger dryas preboreal transition at 11 650 years b p the o180 160 record shows frequent rapid switches between intermediate interstadial and low stadial values fourier spectra of the oscillations that are superimposed on the orbitally induced changes contain a strong periodicity at 1 5 kyr a broad peak at 4 0 kyr and additional shorter periods detailed comparison of the gisp2 180 160 record with the vostok antarctica 15d record pacific ocean foraminiferal 180 160 grande pile france tree pollen and insolation indicates that a counterpart to many of the rapid 180 160 fluctuations of gisp2 can be found in the other records and that the gisp2 isotopic changes clearly are the local expression of climate changes of worldwide extent correlation of events on the independent gisp2 and specmap time scales for the interval 10 000 50 000 years b p shows excellent chronometric agreement except possibly for the event labeled 3 1 the glacial to interglacial transition evidently started simultaneously in the arctic and the antarctic but its development and its expression in greenland isotopes was later suppressed by the influence of meltwater especially from the barents sea ice sheet on deep water formation and ocean circulation meltwaters from different ice sheets bordering the north atlantic also influenced ocean circulation during the bolling allerod interstadial complex and the younger dryas and led to a distinct development of european climate and greenland 180 160 values the holocene interval with long term stable mean isotopic values contains several fluauations with periods from years to millennia dominant is a 6 3 year oscillation with amplitude up to 3 to 4 0 periodicities of 11 and 210 years also found in the solar modulated records of the cosmogenic isotopes 1obe and 14c suggest solar processes as the cause of these cycles depression of180 160 values cooling by volcanic eruptions is observed in stacked gisp215 80 records but the effect is small and not likely to trigger major climate changes

stable isotopes in the basal silty ice preserved in the greenland ice sheet at summit environmental implications modelling ice sheet behaviour in the context of climatic changes depends on initial and boundary conditions which can be better defined by studying the composition of basal ice this study deals with basal ice reached by deep drilling at summit in central greenland grip core the isotopic composition of this ice indicates that ice formed at the ground surface in the absence of the ice sheet largely contributed to its formation the basal silty ice is a remnant of a growing stage of the ice sheet possibly the original build up

tracer transport in the greenland ice sheet constraints on ice cores and glacial history the climate history and dynamics of the greenland ice sheet are studied using a coupled model of the depositional provenance and transport of glacier ice allowing simultaneous prediction of the detailed isotopic stratigraphy of ice cores at all the major greenland sites adopting a novel method for reconstructing the age depth relationship we greatly improve the accuracy of semi lagrangian tracer tracking schemes and can readily incorporate an age dependent ice rheology the larger aim of our study is to impose new constraints on the glacial history of the greenland ice sheet leading sources of uncertainty in the climate and dynamic history are encapsulated in a small number of parameters the temperature and elevation isotopic sensitivities the glacial interglacial precipitation contrast and the effective viscosity of ice in the flow law comparing predicted and observed ice layering at ice core sites we establish plausible ranges for the key model parameters identify climate and dynamic histories that are mutually consistent and recover the past depositional elevation of ice cores to ease interpretation of their climatic records with the coupled three dimensional model of ice dynamics and provenance transport we propose a method to place all the ice core records on a common time scale and use discrepancies to adjust the reconstructed climate history analysis of simulated grip ice layering and borehole temperature profiles confirms that the grip record is sensitive to the dynamic as well as to the climatic history but not enough to strongly limit speculation on the state of the greenland ice sheet during the eemian in contrast our study indicates that the dye 3 and camp century ice cores are extremely sensitive to ice dynamics and greatly constrain eemian ice sheet reconstructions we suggest that the maximum eemian sea level contribution of the ice sheet was in the range of 3 5 4 5 m

evidence for general instability of past climate from a 250 kyr ice core record recent results1 2 from two ice cores drilled in central greenland have revealed large abrupt climate changes of at least regional extent during the late stages of the last glaciation suggesting that climate in the north atlantic region is able to reorganize itself rapidly perhaps even within a few decades here we present a detailed stable isotope record for the full length of the greenland ice core project summit ice core extending over the past 250 kyr according to a calculated timescale we find that climate instability was not confined to the last glaciation but appears also to have been marked during the last interglacial as explored more fully in a companion paper3 and during the previous saale holstein glacial cycle this is in contrast with the extreme stability of the holocene suggesting that recent climate stability may be the exception rather than the rule the last interglacial seems to have lasted longer than is implied by the deep sea specmap record4 in agreement with other land based observations5 6 we suggest that climate instability in the early part of the last interglacial may have delayed the melting of the saalean ice sheets in america and eurasia perhaps accounting for this discrepancy

the upper paleozoic coalbed methane system in the qinshui basin china the coalbed methane resource is very abundant in qinshui basin 3 28 1012 m3 114 tcf the investigation on the upper paleozoic coalbed methane system is a guide to the exploration and development of coalbed methane the upper paleozoic coalbed methane system in the qinshui basin is sealed by a low permeability roof and floor strata comprising mudstone siltstone and bauxite of the carboniferous benxi formation and the permian shanxi and xiashihezi formations the overburden is the lower permian xiashihezi formation and the upper permian triassic and middle jurassic clastic deposits the source and reservoir rocks are the carboniferous permian coal seams the hydrocarbon generation of the source rocks reached its first peak in the late triassic the highest maturity was about ro 1 2 under a normal paleogeothermal gradient 2 3c 100 m 1 1 1 7f 100 ft a tectonic thermal event during the jurassic and cretaceous yanshanian orogeny enhanced the coal maturity and caused a second peak of hydrocarbon generation varying igneous intrusions caused the coal maturity to be higher in the southern northern and eastern parts of the qinshui basin instead of the central and western parts the highest maturity was greater than ro 4 in the jincheng area the migrated thermogenetic coalbed methane accumulated in the reservoirs in which abnormally high reservoir pressure exists locally under the hydrodynamic drive because of the different hydrodynamic background and sealing condition the distribution of coalbed methane content is inhomogeneous the reservoir is undersaturated with gas in most areas based on the coalbed methane system investigation we assessed the coalbed methane producibility in different parts of the qinshui basin and the major producibility area is in the southern part of the basin

holocene climatic records from agassiz ice cap ellesmere island nwt canada four ice cores from the top of the agassiz ice cap and down a flow line have been variously analysed for 8 18o ecm solid conductivity and ice melt layer stratigraphy stratigraphic correlation

115 year ice core data from akademii nauk ice cap severnaya zemlya high resolution record of eurasian arctic climate change from 1999 to 2001 a 724 m deep ice core was drilled on akademii nauk ice cap severnaya zemlya to gain high resolution proxy data from the central russian arctic despite strong summertime meltwater percolation this ice core provides valuable information on the regional climate and environmental history we present data of stable water isotopes melt layer content and major ions from the uppermost 57 m of this core covering the period 1883 1998 dating was achieved by counting seasonal isotopic cycles and using reference horizons multi annual 18 o values reflect eurasian sub arctic and arctic surface air temperature variations we found strong correlations to instrumental temperature data from some stations e g r 0 62 for vardo northern norway the 18 o values show pronounced 20th century temperature changes with a strong rise about 1920 and the absolute temperature maximum in the 1930s a recent decrease in the deuterium excess time series indicates an increasing role of the kara sea as a regional moisture source from the multi annual ion variations we deduced decreasing sea salt aerosol trends in the 20th century as reflected by sodium and chloride whereas sulphate and nitrate are strongly affected by anthropogenic pollution

substantial contribution to sea level rise during the last interglacial from the greenland ice sheet during the last interglacial period the eemian global sea level was at least three metres and probably more than five metres higher than at present1 2 complete melting of either the west antarctic ice sheet or the greenland ice sheet would today raise sea levels by 6 7 metres but the high sea levels during the last interglacial period have been proposed to result mainly from disintegration of the west antarctic ice sheet3 with model studies attributing only 1 2 m of sea level rise to meltwater from greenland4 5 this result was considered consistent with ice core evidence4 although earlier work had suggested a much reduced greenland ice sheet during the last interglacial period6 here we reconsider the eemian evolution of the greenland ice sheet by combining numerical modelling with insights obtained from recent central greenland ice core analyses our results suggest that the greenland ice sheet was considerably smaller and steeper during the eemian and plausibly contributed 4 5 5 m to the sea level highstand during that period we conclude that the high sea level during the last interglacial period most probably included a large contribution from greenland meltwater and therefore should not be interpreted as evidence for a significant reduction of the west antarctic ice sheet

sr nd pb isotope evidence for ice sheet presence on southern greenland during the last interglacial to ascertain the response of the southern greenland ice sheet gis to a boreal summer climate warmer than at present we explored whether southern greenland was deglaciated during the last interglacial lig using the sr nd pb isotope ratios of silt sized sediment discharged from southern greenland our isotope data indicate that no single southern greenland geologic terrane was completely deglaciated during the lig similar to the holocene differences in sediment sources during the lig relative to the early holocene denote however greater southern gis retreat during the lig these results allow the evaluation of a suite of gis models and are consistent with a gis contribution of 1 6 to 2 2 meters to the 4 meter lig sea level highstand requiring a significant sea level contribution from the antarctic ice sheet