Mineralogy, geochemistry, and reserve estimation of the Euphrates limestone for Portland cement industry at Al-Najaf are
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ORIGINAL PAPER
Mineralogy, geochemistry, and reserve estimation of the Euphrates limestone for Portland cement industry at Al-Najaf area, South Iraq Mautaz Al-Dabbas & Salih Muhammad Awadh & Ayad Abed Zaid
Received: 12 April 2011 / Accepted: 20 June 2011 # Saudi Society for Geosciences 2011
Abstract This study deals with the mineralogical and geochemistry of the Euphrates Formation (Lower Miocene) in Bahr Al-Najaf area in order to assess the lithofacies of the Euphrates Formation for Portland cement manufacturing. Petrographic and mineralogical studies were carried out on 210 core samples, collected from 21 boreholes, and showed that calcite is the dominant mineral with few amounts of quartz, gypsum, feldspar, and a rare amount of dolomite. Clay mineral suites (palygorskite, kaolinite, montmorillonite, and illite) formed about 5% from the total mineral composition. Palygorskite precipitated directly in alkali shallow water rich with Si and Mg ions. Chemical weathering of feldspar under acidic conditions participated in formation of Kaolinite. Geochemistry showed that there is no high variation in chemical constituents with depth, and the average of CaO (51.5), MgO (0.83), SO3 (0.54), SiO2 (4.3), Fe2O3 (0.45), Al2O3 (0.93), L.O.I (40.7), Na2O3 (0.08), K2O (0.14), and Cl- (0.1) qualified the lithofacies of Euphrates Formation to be raw materials suitable for manufacturing the Portland cement. Triangle Block method is applied to estimate the reserve on square area (2×2 km2) which is computed to be 63 million tons of medium-tough limestone as potential probable reserve.
M. Al-Dabbas : S. M. Awadh (*) Earth Sciences Department, College of Science, University of Baghdad, Baghdad, Iraq e-mail: [email protected] A. A. Zaid Al-Kufa Cement Plant, Kufa, Iraq
Keywords Mineralogy . Geochemistry . Reserve estimation . Cement industry . Iraq
Introduction The cement production in Iraq was initiated at 1949, where the first plant was established with production capacity of about 8,000 t per year. As a result of economic and constructional progress and project development, there was an increase in demand of this material and to serve new companies and plants to cover local market needs. The General Southern Company for Cement is one of three companies that were distributed to in the north, central, and south of Iraq. This includes eight factories in: Al-Najaf, Al-Kufa, Karbala, Al-Sadaa, AlMuthana, Al-Samawa, and Um-Qasir. Their conventional products are two kinds of cement, normal and resistance. Industrialization of these products depended on raw materials such as limestone, clay, and gypsum, which were considered as the key to success of the cement industry. The favorable formation for purpose of Portland cement industry is the Euphrates Formation. The chemical composition for the clinker of Portland cement (mixture from 70% limestone+30% clay) depends essentially on the chemical composition of the raw materials (Dabous et al. 1989). The Euphrates Formation which has many exposures in the Iraqi Western Desert especial
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