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<br />• Between Unit 4 and Unit 5 is a 40- to 60-foot-thick sequence of the Thirteenmile <br />Creek Tongue (Tgtu) of the Eocene Green River Formation. The upper part of the <br />Thirteenmile Creek Tongue is composed of a light gray to white weathered <br />marlstone. South of the Piceance Site, the Thirteenmile Creek Tongue contains <br />three to four thin, rich oil shale beds. North of the Piceance Site, the marlstone <br />contains a few thin, porous ostracod charophyte-bearing limestone beds. <br />In addition to the Uinta and Green River Formations, Quaternary Holocene <br />alluvium (Qal) is found in the dry washes and the Piceance Creek valley floor. The <br />alluvium consists of silt, sand, and gravel along the floodplains and alluvial fans in <br />the larger valleys. The floodplain deposits are mostly gray, brown, and buff silts and <br />sands. The alluvial fan deposits consist of angular sandstone and marlstone <br />boulders and pebbles mixed with silts and sands derived from nearby hilly terrain. <br />The alluvium is less than 50 feet thick (Duncan 1976). <br />The stratigraphy underlying the Piceance Site is the same as that detailed in Section <br />7.2.1 for regional geology. Asite-specific stratigraphic section for the Piceance Site is <br />presented in Figure 7-7. It should be noted that the highest concentration of halite <br />in the Saline Zone of the Parachute Creek Member of the Green River Formation is <br />found toward the center of the Piceance Creek Basin. The Piceance Site is located in <br />the dawsonite-nahcolite zone and on the edge of the area containing halite (see <br />Figure 7-1). To better understand the geologic structure underlying the Piceance <br />• Site, two cross sections were prepared using data from existing exploration holes in <br />the area to assess the subsurface geologic structure (Figure 7-8). Exploration holes <br />were selected based on a north-south trend or an east-west trend, as well as on the <br />amount of detail contained in each log. The west-to-east cross section (cross section <br />A - A') presented in Figure 7-9, and the south-to-north cross section (cross section B <br />- B') is presented in Figure 7-10. Both cross sections show the alternating anticlinal <br />and synclinal features buried within the Piceance Creek Basin. Examining both <br />cross sections together shows that the southern portion of the Piceance Site is rising <br />out of a trough. Monitoring well 20-1 appears to be either resting on the <br />northeastern flank of the ascending trough or near the crest of a small anticlinal <br />feature. <br />Pipeline Corridor <br />The majority of the pipeline corridor will lie on the Uinta Formation, which is <br />described in 7.2.1.1, above. At the two locations where the pipeline crosses Piceance <br />Creek, the primary geologic structure is modern alluvium, which includes the Piney <br />Creek alluvium and younger deposits (Tweto 1979). At Davis Point, the pipeline <br />crosses the Parachute Creek Member of the Green River Formation and, at the base <br />of Davis Point, lower parts of the Green River Formation (Tweto 1979). <br />C~ <br />American Soda, L.L.P. 7_(~ <br />Commercial Mine Plan <br />August 18, 1998 <br />