RASMUSSEN, DONALD L.
Paradox Basin Data, Denver, CO

Abstract: Siliciclastic Wedges in Pennsylvanian Sequences of Uncompahgre Trough and Paradox Basin, Colorado and Utah

Siliciclastics eroded from the Uncompahgre highlands were carried west- and southwestward into the Uncompahgre Trough and Paradox Basin throughout the entire depositional sequence for many of the Pennsylvanian cycles recognized in the basin. Individual wedges are thickest (exceeding 300 meters) where there was contemporaneous underlying salt flowage and during lowstand and transgressive intervals within the respective depositional sequence, and thinnest during the highstand interval. Thick wedges may even intertongue the contemporaneous deposition of halite and potash with reservoir quality preserved to allow gas production from arkosic sandstones in the wedges. Wedges were localized in the Uncompahgre Trough during the Morrowan, Atokan and most of the Desmoinesian, and progressively prograded into the Paradox Basin during the latest Desmoinesian, Missourian, and Virgilian.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90919©1999 AAPG Rocky Mountain Section Meeting, Bozeman, Montana