Permian Coal Basins and Properties in Eastern Australia

Two major databases detail the stratigraphy, structure, and properties of Permian coals across eastern Australia, covering an area comparable to Europe's Carboniferous coal basins from Scotland to the western Soviet Union. The report, produced by the Bureau of Mineral Resources and CSIRO, includes 42 plates and dozens of line drawings illustrating surface and underground geology, sedimentology, and coal chemistry. It categorizes basins into three tectonic groups, including interior basins with over 3 trillion tonnes of coal.

Use Cases

• Classify basin tectonic groups (rift, intracratonic, marginal) using stratigraphic and structural data.
• Model coal seam thickness, up to 30 meters, against basin sedimentology and depositional environment features.
• Analyze coal properties like vitrinite content and semifusinite ratios against palaeo-water table and deposition rate data.
• Correlate coal measure sequences (basal, middle, upper) with separating lacustrine or marine sediment layers.
• Map the extent of Early Permian ice sheet and periglacial conditions across the southern quarter of Australia.

Strengths

• Report covers an enormous geographical area equivalent to Europe's Carboniferous coal basins.
• Integrates two major databases from BMR and CSIRO with stratigraphic, structural, and coal property data.
• Analysis includes 42 plates and dozens of line drawings detailing geology and coal properties.

Limitations

• Primary data format is PDF/HTML report, requiring extraction for computational analysis.
• Specific row counts, column names, and sample data for the underlying databases are unavailable.
• Temporal coverage is focused on the Permian period, with no indication of modern updates to the resource assessment.

Provenance

Source

Australian Ocean Data Network, incorporating data from the Bureau of Mineral Resources and CSIRO.

Collection Method

Compilation and analysis of geological survey data, stratigraphic studies, and coal property measurements.

Time Range

Permian period.

Freshness

null

Geography

Eastern Australia, from Cape York to Tasmania, between the coast and the middle of the Great Artesian Basin.