Sedimentology, Stratigraphy, and Chemostratigraphy of Eocene-Miocene Carbonate Successions in the Western Caribbean:The White Limestone, Jamaica

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2017-05

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Abstract

Eocene-Miocene shallow marine carbonates have become major oil and gas reservoir targets along the Circum-Caribbean. In this sense, the Eocene-Miocene carbonate record from Jamaica may constitute an important frontier for the exploration of fossil fuels in this region. Here, I present sedimentologic, stratigraphic, petrographic, and chemostratigraphic information for the Eocene-Miocene carbonate record from the North Coast Belt and the Wagwater Trough, Jamaica from which their age, depositional environment, and paragenetic history are constrained. Deposition of shallow marine photozoan carbonates predominated along the Wagwater Trough area during the Middle-Late Eocene, while pelagic carbonate successions prevailed along the North Coast Belt. The production and deposition of shallow marine carbonate declined during the Early Oligocene and Early Miocene interval. This regional hiatus in carbonate deposition has been observed in other Circum-Caribbean basins, i.e. the Nicaragua Rise, the San Jacinto Basin, Colombia, the Alta and Baja Guajira basins, Colombia, and the Falcon Basin, Venezuela. A new period of shallow marine carbonate deposition started during the Middle Oligocene when a major transgression occurred. This new interval of carbonate deposition is characterized by the occurrence of photozoans as the primary carbonates. A new decrease in sea-level occurred during the Early Miocene and led to the deposition of heterozoan, red-algae dominated, carbonate factories. The observed changes in carbonate factories in the onshore carbonate record of Jamaica influenced the diagenetic processes that ultimately affected the potential reservoir quality of these carbonate successions, i.e. the carbonate porosity. While heterozoan carbonates display predominant red algae and benthic foraminifera and high porosity, photozoans carbonates (coralline and planktic-foraminifera dominated) display important amounts of micrite, which obliterates the carbonate porosity. However, dissolution and dolomitization are additional processes that have affected the overall carbonate porosities.

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Carbonate Factories, The White Limestone Group, Jamaica, Western Caribbean

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