Modern Clastic Depositional Environments

During this course, we will visit a range of depositional settings within one of the only river-fed deltas on the US east coast. The Santee Delta is a mixed-process delta of moderate to small size situated between the strandplain shorelines of Long and Onslow Bays to the north, and the barrier island-dominated coast to the south. We will discuss and gain first-hand knowledge of fluvial, deltaic, estuarine, barrier island, and shallow marine stratigraphic architecture and sedimentology at core and reservoir scale. The nearly direct connection between depositional processes and products that we can observe in these modern settings is crucial to understanding their subsurface distributions. By the end of this course, you will be able to identify the key stratigraphic components of siliciclastic, passive margin settings in the core, outcrop (trenches), and high-resolution seismic data. These components are the basic building blocks of hydrocarbon reservoirs and determine the vertical and lateral heterogeneity which ultimately influences connectivity and productivity.

Throughout our trip, we will define the basic stratigraphic elements and lithofacies associations found within a range of fluvial and paralic depositional environments. We will use these components to discuss depositional trends that we would expect in response to progradational, aggradational, or retrogradational conditions and how the resulting stratigraphic architecture would influence overall reservoir quality and continuity. In addition to these allogenically-forced trends, we will discuss environmental and facies variability associated with autogenic (i.e. intrinsic) processes. The concepts and learnings that we will build together will serve as a foundation for the Book Cliffs course, where ancient examples of these modern depositional environments are exposed in the world-class outcrops of Utah.