PALEOENVIRONMENTS AND PETROGRAPHIC EVALUATION OF THE EOCENE BENDE-AMEKI FORMATION, SOUTH EASTERN NIGERIA

Abstract

The Eocene Bende fringe of the prolific Niger Delta. Associated sediments within this formation includes; sandstones, siltstones, claystone, shales and lignites. The present research investigated the paleoenvironments and petrographic composition of the outcrop sandstones expose granulometric analysis shows that the sand 1.73Φ), moderately to poorly sorted (0.70 are strongly coarse to fine skewed ( paleoenvironment. T standard deviation likewise revealed the fluvial setting of the sandstones. Also, petrographic evaluation result reveals that the predominant mineral is quartz with average mean of 67 73%), appreciable amount of feldspars with average mean of 19.2% (16 proportion of rock fragments with average mean of 3.6% (1 abundance of the quartz indicates the contribution from both medium rocks for the sandstones. More so, the appreciable amount of feldspars in the sandstones favours either high relief or tropical climate as the source area. Quartz ternary plot for the sandstones suggests a and paleoenvironmental analyses carried out, it is evident that the moderately sandstones of the study area were deposited in a fluvial environment where there are contributions from medium-high grade metamorphic rocks