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Clay diagenesis in the Kimmeridge Clay Formation, onshore UK, and its relation to organic maturation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 July 2018

Iain C. Scotchman
Iain C. Scotchman*
Affiliation:
Dept. of Geology, Beaumont Building, University of Sheffield, Brookhill, Sheffield
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Abstract

Conversion of randomly ordered illite-smectite to ordered illite-smectite in the Upper Jurassic Kimmeridge Clay Formation from the North Sea has been recorded in the literature as occurring within the ‘oil window’ and has been suggested as an indicator of oil source rock maturity. Studies of authigenic clay minerals in the fine fraction (>0.5 µm) of the Kimmeridge Clay Formation mudstones from fourteen locations along the UK onshore outcrop between Dorset and North Yorkshire show that they comprise mainly ordered illite-smectites. The onshore Kimmeridge Clay section is organically immature, suggesting that the illite-smectite ordering reaction cannot be extrapolated between basins as an inorganic indicator of ‘oil window’ levels of maturity. These results also have important implications in source rock hydrocarbon expulsion and migration models which involve shale dewatering as a flushing agent. However, dewatering of shales may aid migration as it could cause fracturing of the shale bands separating the organic-rich layers within the source rock, prior to hydrocarbon generation.

Keywords

clay diagenesisKimmeridge Clay Formationillitesmectiteorganic maturation
Type
Mineralogy and petroleum genesis
Information
Mineralogical Magazine , Volume 51 , Issue 362 , October 1987 , pp. 535 - 551
Copyright
Copyright © The Mineralogical Society of Great Britain and Ireland 1987

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Footnotes

1

Present address: Amoco (UK) Exploration Co, Amoco House, 1 Stephen Street, London W1P 2AU

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