Circular 159—Geology and mineral deposits of Ochoan rocks in Deleware Basin and adjacent areas

Compiled by G. S. Austin, 1978, 87 pp., 16 tables, 73 figs.

Contains papers and abstracts of papers presented at the Symposium on the Ochoan Rocks of Southeastern New Mexico and West Texas, at Carlsbad, New Mexico, May 4, 1977. Rocks of Upper Permian area in southeastern New Mexico and west Texas have produced an abundance of hydrocarbons, potash, and sulfur. Although much geologic literature is available on the region in general and on petroleum geology in particular, relatively little has been published recently on the nonmetallic ores, and there seems to be a paucity of information on southwestern New Mexico. In addition the relationships of the petroleum industry to the potash industry and of mining engineers to geologists have not been adequately examined. With these points in mind, the New Mexico Bureau of Mines and Mineral Resources decided in 1975 that a conference held in Carlsbad to address these problems would be particularly appropriate.

Two other interested groups, the New Mexico Geological Society and the Permian Basin Section of the Society of Economic Paleontologists and Mineralogists, were subsequently invited to co-sponsor the meeting. In a division of responsibilities, the NMGS decided to oversee the symposium on Ochoan rocks, which was to be held on the first day of the meeting, and a series of premeeting trips to all 7 operating potash mines and to Carlsbad Caverns. The symposium on the upper Guadalupian rocks on the second day of the meeting and a postmeeting two-day field trip to the upper Guadalupian shelf and shelf facies of the Permian reef complex in the nearby Guadalupe Mountains were handled by the PBS-SEPM. The PBS-SEPM also published a volume for the conference containing all of the papers given at the upper Guadalupian symposium, plus the road logs for the postmeeting field trip. And now the New Mexico Bureau of Mines and Mineral Resources is publishing the collection of the papers given at the Ochoan symposium.

The conference was held on May 3–7, 1977, in Carlsbad and was attended by about 150 geologists and engineers; most were from the southwestern U.S., but one participant came all the way from France. This circular contains 13 expanded papers from the 18 oral presentations given at the Ochoan symposium, plus an expanded abstract of one of the papers from the upper Guadalupian symposium. These papers contain much of the latest information of the area and include several papers from the mining industry that significantly increase its value. Abstracts of the papers given at the Ochoan symposium but not presented for publication are included at the back.