High Resolution Sequence and Chemostratigraphic Correlations of the Grayburg Formation - Shattuck Escarpment and Plowman Ridge: Testing Models of Shelf-to-Basin Frameworks

Sam Hiebert
The University of Texas at Austin, Jackson School of Geosciences Austin, Texas, United States of America
[email protected]

The Grayburg Formation (Late Permian, Guadalupian) is a shallow-marine mixed carbonate-siliciclastic succession deposited along the margins of the Permian foreland basin of Texas and New Mexico. Sea-level cyclicity during the Permian was transitional from the high-amplitude glacial-eustatic fluctuations of the icehouse Pennsylvanian, to the low-amplitude eustatic fluctuations of the Greenhouse Triassic (Lehrmann and Goldhammer 1999). The Grayburg-Queen interval in the Guadalupe Mountains is the least studied of the major formations exposed in this classic outcrop belt and is second only to the San Andres Formation in terms of cumulative hydrocarbon production in the subsurface (Bebout and Harris 1986, 1990). Correlation frameworks of the Guadalupe Mountains hinge on the Grayburg-Queen interval as these strata form a transition between the San Andres ramps of the Algerita Escarpment and the classic reef-rimmed Artesia Group/ Capitan system of the Southern Guadalupe Mountains. Significant discrepancies exist between published models of shelf to basin correlations within this stratigraphic interval (Sarg et al.1999 vs. Kerans and Fitchen 1994; Kerans and Tinker 2000). Central to the different interpretations is the nature of correlation of mixed carbonate-siliciclastic cycles between the Shattuck Escarpment and the Plowman Ridge area of the Brokeoff Mountains. This study revisits these contrasting models using high resolution cyclostratigraphy in conjunction with chemostratigraphy to determine a best-fit correlation of the Grayburg Formation mixed carbonate-siliciclastic high-frequency cycles between the Shattuck Escarpment of the Guadalupe Mountains and the Plowman Ridge area of the Brokeoff Mountains.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90157©2012 AAPG Foundation 2012 Grants-in-Aid Projects