Volcaniclastic Sedimentary Rocks 41
Peat is heterogeneous because it is made up of differ-
ent types of vegetation, and of the various different
components (wood, leaves, seeds, etc.) of the plants.
Moreover, the vegetation forming the peat may vary
with time, depending on the predominance of either
tree communities or herbaceous plants, and this will
be reflected as layers in the beds of coal. A nomencla-
ture for the description of different lithotypes of coal
has therefore been developed as follows:
Vitrain: bright, shiny black coal that usually breaks
cubically and mostly consists of woody tissue.
Durain: black or grey in colour, dull and rough coal
that usually contains a lot of spore and detrital plant
material.
Fusain: black, fibrous with a silky lustre, friable and
soft coal that represents fossil charcoal.
Clarain: banded, layered coal that consists of alter-
nations of the other three types.
Sapropelic coal has a conchoidal fracture and may
have a dull black lustre (called cannel coal) or is
black/brown in colour (known as boghead coal).
Microscopic examination of these lithotypes reveals
that a number of different particle types can be recog-
nised: these are called macerals, and are the organic
equivalent of minerals in rocks. Macerals are exam-
ined by looking at the coal as polished surfaces in
reflected light under a thin layer of oil. Three main
groups of maceral are recognised: vitrinite, the origin
of which is mainly cell walls of woody tissue and
leaves, liptinite, which mainly comes from spores,
cuticles and resins, and inertinite, which is burnt,
oxidised or degraded plant material.
A further analysis that can be made is the reflec-
tance of the different particles, which can be assessed
by measuring the amount of light reflected from the
polished surface. Liptinites generally have low reflec-
tance, and inertinites have high reflectance, but vitri-
nite, which is by far the most common maceral in
most coals, shows different reflectance depending on
the coal rank. Vitrinite reflectance therefore can be
used as a measure of the rank of the coal, and because
coal rank increases with the temperature to which the
material has been heated, vitrinite reflectance is a mea-
sure of the burial temperature of the bed. This is an
analytical technique in basin analysis (24.8) that pro-
vides a measure of how deep a bed has been buried.
The coalification of carbonaceous matter into mac-
erals and coal lithotypes takes place as a series of post-
depositional bacteriological, chemical and physical
processes that are considered further in section 18.7.2.
3.6.3 Oil shales and tar sands
Mudrocks that contain a high proportion of organic
material that can be driven off as a liquid or gas by
heating are called oil shales. The organic material is
usually the remains of algae that have broken down
during diagenesis to form kerogen, long-chain hydro-
carbons that form petroleum (natural oil and gas)
when they are heated. Oil shales are therefore impor-
tant source rocks of the hydrocarbons that ultimately
form concentrations of oil and gas. The environments
in which they are formed must be anaerobic to pre-
vent oxidisation of the organic material; suitable con-
ditions are found in lakes and certain restricted
shallow-marine environments (Eugster 1985). Oil
shales are black and the presence of hydrocar-
bons may be detected by the smell of the rock and
the fact that it will make a brown, oily stain on other
materials.
Tar sands or oil sands are clastic sediments that
are saturated with hydrocarbons and they are the
exposed equivalents of subsurface oil reservoirs
(18.7.4). The oil in tar sands is usually very viscous
(bitumen), and may be almost solid, because the
lighter components of the hydrocarbons that are pres-
ent at depth are lost by biodegradation near the sur-
face. The presence of the oil in the pores of the
sediment prevents the formation of any cement, so
tar sands remain unlithified, held together only by the
bitumen that gives them a black or very dark brown
colour.
3.7 VOLCANICLASTIC SEDIMENTARY
ROCKS
Volcanic eruptions are the most obvious and spectacu-
lar examples of the formation of both igneous and sedi-
mentary rocks on the Earth’s surface. During eruption
volcanoes produce a range of materials that include
molten lava flowing from fissures in the volcano and
particulate material that is ejected from the vent to form
volcaniclastic deposits (Cas & Wright 1987). The
location of volcanoes is related to the plate tectonic
setting, mainly in the vicinity of plate margins and
other areas of high heat flow in the crust. The pre-
sence of beds formed by volcanic processes can be an
important indicator of the tectonic setting in which
the sedimentary succession formed. Lavas are found
close to the site of the eruption, but ash may be spread
42 Biogenic, Chemical and Volcanogenic Sediments

tens, hundreds or even thousands of kilometres away. (a)

Volcaniclastic material may therefore occur in any Clast size Unconsolidated Consolidated
depositional environment and hence may be found
associated with a wide variety of other sedimentary Bombs Agglomerate
rocks (Chapter 17). Volcanic rocks are also of consid- >64 mm
erable value in stratigraphy as they may often be Blocks Volcanic breccia
dated radiometrically (21.1), providing an absolute
time constraint on the sedimentary succession. 2-64 mm Lapilli Lapillistone

0.063-2 mm Coarse ash Coarse tuff

3.7.1 Types of volcaniclastic rocks (volcanic sandstone)

<0.063 mm Fine ash Fine tuff

The composition of the magma affects the style of
eruption. Basaltic magmas tend to form volcanoes
that produce large volumes of lava, but small
amounts of volcanic ash. Volcanoes with more silicic
magma are much more explosive, with large amounts
of the molten rock being ejected from the volcano as
particulate matter. The particles ejected are known as
pyroclastic material, also collectively referred to as
tephra. Note that the term pyroclastic is used for
material ejected from the volcano as particles and
volcaniclastic refers to any deposit that is mainly
composed of volcanic detritus. Pyroclastic material
may be individual crystals, pieces of volcanic rock
(lithic fragments), or pumice, the highly vesicular,
chilled, ‘froth’ of the molten rock. The size of the
pyroclastic debris ranges from fine dust a few microns
across to pieces that may be several metres across.
3.7.2 Nomenclature of volcaniclastic rocks
The textural classification of volcaniclastic deposits
(Fig. 3.12) is a modification of the Wentworth scheme.
Coarse material (over 64 mm) is divided into volcanic
blocks, which were solid when erupted, and volcanic
bombs, which were partly molten and have cooled in
the air; consolidated into a rock these are referred to
as volcanic breccia and agglomerate respectively.
Granule to pebble-sized particles (2–64 mm) are called
lapilli and form a lapillistone. Accretionary
lapilli are spherical aggregates of fine ash formed
during air fall. Sand-, silt- and clay-grade tephra is
ash when unconsolidated and tuff upon lithification.
Coarse ash/tuff is sand-sized and fine ash/tuff is silt-
and clay-grade material. Compositional descriptions
hinge on the relative proportions of crystals, lithic
fragments and vitric material, which is fragments of
volcanic glass formed when the molten rock cools
very rapidly, sometimes forming pumice.
(volcanic mudstone)
(b) Glass shards
and pumice
Vitric ash
Vitric tuff
Crystal ash Lithic ash
Crystal tuff Lithic tuff
Mineral Lithic
grains fragments
Fig. 3.12 (a) The classification of volcaniclastic sediments
and sedimentary rocks based on the grain size of the material.
(b) Nomenclature used for loose ash and consolidated tuff with
different proportions of lithic, vitric and crystal components.
3.7.3 Recognition of volcaniclastic material
The origin of coarse-grained volcaniclastic sediments
is usually easy to determine if the lithology of the
larger clasts can be recognised as an igneous rock
such as basalt. The tephra particles are usually angu-
lar, with the exception of rounded volcanic bombs,
well-rounded accretionary lapilli found in some air
fall ashes, and the distinctive shape of fiamme, glassy
pumice fragments that may resemble a tuning fork
when compacted. Another useful indicator is the uni-
form nature of the material, as mixing of tephra with
other types of sediment occurs only by subsequent
reworking. In general, volcaniclastic sediments with

a basaltic composition are dark in colour, whereas
more rhyolitic deposits are paler. Fine ash and tuff
can be more difficult to identify with certainty in the
field, especially if the material has been weathered.
Brightly coloured green and orange strata sometimes
form as a result of the alteration of ash beds. Char-
acteristic sedimentary structures resulting from the
processes of transport are considered further in Chap-
ter 17 along with the environments of deposition of
volcaniclastic sediments.
Petrographic analysis of volcaniclastic sediments is
usually required to confirm the composition. In thin-
section the composition of lithic fragments can be deter-
mined if a high magnification is used to identify the
minerals that make up the rock fragments. Crystals of
feldspar are usually common, especially if the deposit is
a crystal tuff, and other silicate minerals may also be
present as euhedral to subhedral crystal grains. Fiamme
can be seen as clear, isotropic grains with characteristic
shapes: volcanic glass is not stable, and in older tuffs the
glass may have a very finely crystalline structure or will
be altered to clay minerals.
Further Reading 43
FURTHER READING
Adams, A.E. & Mackenzie, W.S. (1998) A Colour Atlas of
Carbonate Sediments and Rocks under the Microscope. Man-
son Publishing, London.
Braithwaite, C. (2005) Carbonate Sediments and Rocks. Whit-
tles Publishing, Dunbeath.
Cas, R.A.F. & Wright, J.V. (1987) Volcanic Successions: Mod-
ern and Ancient. Unwin-Hyman, London.
Northolt, A.J.G. & Jarvis, I. (1990) Phosphorite Research and
Development. Special Publication 52, Geological Society
Publishing House, Bath.
Scholle, P.A. (1978) A Color Illustrated Guide to Carbonate
Rock Consituents, Textures, Cements and Porosities. Mem-
oir 27, American Association of Petroleum Geologists,
Tulsa.
Scoffin, T.P. (1987) Carbonate Sediments and Rocks. Blackie,
Glasgow, 274 pp.
Stow, D.A. (2005) Sedimentary Rocks in the Field: a Colour
Guide. Manson, London.
Tucker, M.E. (2001) Sedimentary Petrology (3rd edition).
Blackwell Science, Oxford.
Tucker, M.E. & Wright, V.P. (1990) Carbonate Sedimentology,
Blackwell Scientific Publications, Oxford, 482 pp.