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Book review |
C.R. Stelck Professor in Petroleum Geology United Kingdom
| The first 250 words of the full text of this article appear below. Images appear only in PDF or full-text views. |
This is a small format book (25 x 17.5 cm) that contains 141 pages of text and 10 pages of colour photographs. The book is divided into 16 chapters that range in length from 2.5 to 21 pages. Thus, some topics receive only brief attention whereas others contain a considerable amount of information. Chapters 1 to 9 cover the basic aspects of carbonate sediments and rocks with overviews on their mineralogy, depositional environments, classification systems, diagenesis, dolomites, and calcretes. Chapters 10 and 11 deal with karst development and hydrology whereas chapters 12 to 14 cover various engineering aspects of carbonate rocks. Chapter 15 is devoted to hydrocarbons and mineral deposits found in carbonates and chapter 16 covers conservation issues. At the end of the book there are 16 pages of references that will be a valuable resource to the person interested in doing further reading on this fascinating and complex group of sedimentary rocks.
As noted in the introduction, the book is an outgrowth of a project that was designed to provide a basic understanding of carbonate rocks and sediments for non-specialists in the petroleum and engineering industries. It is not intended for the specialist. Carbonate sediments and rocks are complex deposits that are, in many respects, still poorly understood. They have engendered many very long, highly specialized books that are daunting challenges to all but the specialists. This book, however, provides a general overview of carbonate sediments and rocks and has managed to capture the essence of carbonate sediments
