PETROLOGY OF

SEDIMENTARY ROCK
Origin, classification, and occurrence of
sedimentary rocks

Classification of sedimentary rocks.

Boggs, jr. 2009

Percent of continents covered

by most important groups of
rocksRonov,
as a function
of age.
A. B., 1983,

Volume percent of sedimentary

rocks as a function of age.
(After Ronov, A. B., 1983)

Tectonic Setting of sediment accumulation

Tectonic Setting of sediment accumulation

SILICICLASTIC
SEDIMENTARY
ROCK

Grain Size

UddenWentworth grain-size
scale for sediments and the
equivalent phi () scale

Grain Size Analysis

Statistical analysis to measured

how is the spread of the grain
size through the sedimentary rock
Phi standard deviation Verbal sorting
<

0.35

0.35 to
0.5 to
0.7 to
1 to

Very

well

sorted

0.50
Well
0.70 Moderately well

sorted
sorted

1.00 Moderately

sorted

2.00 Poorly

sorted

Sorting

Phi standard deviation Verbal sorting

<

0.35

0.35 to
0.5 to
0.7 to

>

Very

well

sorted

0.50
Well
0.70 Moderately well

sorted
sorted

1.00 Moderately

sorted

1 to
2.00 Poorly
2 to
4.00 Very
4.00
Extremely

poorly
poorly

sorted
sorted
sorted

Application and significance of grain-size data

grain size and sorting affect

the porosity and
permeability of sedimentary
rocks
grain-size characteristics
reflect depositional
conditions and processes
and thus depositional
environments

Significance of form and roundness

these parameters have not proven to be

especially reliable guides to the provenance
and transport histories of siliciclastic sediment
shape does have an influence on the settling
velocity of particles in a fluid and that departure
of a grain from a spherical shape causes a
decrease in settling velocity
shape (form) is known to affect the
transportability of particles moving by traction

SEM analysis of grain surface texture

scanning electron microscope (SEM) in the late 1960s, the

technique for studying surface texture at high magnifications

the energy conditions within each environment will tend to

produce surface textural features that reflect that environment
and that thesefeatures will differ from environment to
environment

Textural maturity

Folk (1951) suggested that

textural maturity of sandstones
encompasses three textural
properties:
(1) the amount of clay-size
sediment in the rock
(2) the sorting of the
framework grains, and
(3) the rounding of the
framework grains.
four stages of textural maturity:
immature, submature, mature,
and supermature

Fabric

Packing: the manner of arrangement or spacing of the solid

particles in a sediment or sedimentary rock; specifically,
the arrangement of clastic grains entirely apart from any
authigenic grains that may have crystallized between them.
Bates and Jackson, 1980.
Pandalai and Basumallick (1984, p. 87) suggest that packing
is the effective utilization of space by mutual arrangement
of the constituent grains of an aggregate.

concerned with the porosity and permeability of sediments and

with changes in these parameters as a function of burial depth
and sediment compaction, petrophysical rock properties and the

Grain Orientation

The
primary
interest
in
particle orientation arises from
its potential usefulness in
paleocurrent analysis. In the
absence
of
distinctive
directional
sedimentary
structures
in
a
deposit,
particle
orientation
may
provide
the only clue
to
Particle orientation
is also
paleocurrent
directions.
believed to have
an effect on
the
permeability
of
sedimentary rocks to fluid
movement and thus is of
interest to hydrologists and
petroleum geologists

Porosity and permeability

In terms of origin, porosity may be either primary (depositional) or secondary

(postdepositional)
Primary porosity can be of three types:
(1) intergranular or interparticle pore space that exists between or among
framework grains, such as siliciclastic particles and carbonate grains (ooids,
fossils, etc.),
(2) intragranular or intraparticle pore space within particles, such as
cavities in fossils and open space in clay minerals, and
(3) intercrystalline pore space between chemically formed crystals, as in
dolomites.
Secondary porosity may include
(1)solution porosity caused by dissolution of cements or metastable
framework grains (feldspars, rock fragments) in siliciclastic sedimentary
rocks or dissolution of cements, fossils, framework crystals, etc. in
carbonate or other chemically formed rocks;
(2)intercrystalline porosity arising from pore space in cements or among
other authigenic minerals, and
(3) fracture porosity, owing to fracturing of any type of rock by tectonic
forces or other processes such as compaction and desiccation.

Permeability

Permeability is expressed
in darcies or millidarcies
(0.001 darcy).
A darcy is defined as a unit
of permeability equivalent
to the passage of one cubic
centimeter of fluid of one
centipoise viscosity flowing
in one second under a
pressure differential of one
atmosphere
through
a
porous medium having an
area of cross-section of one
square centimeter and a
length of one centimeter

Permeability

Permeability is a complex function of

particle size, sorting, shape, packing,
and orientation of sediments. The
exact relationship of permeability to
each of these variables is still not
fully understood, and no attempt is
made here to develop a rigorous
treatment of these relationships