Glen Canyon Group, Sevier Basin and Kaiparowitz Bench
General Setting
The Glen Canyon Group is developed in the subsurface in the Kaiparowitz Basin area in south-central Utah in the southwest part of the Colorado Plateau. It is also present in the subsurface in the east part of the Sevier Basin, a foreland basin in southwestern Utah, and the Uinta Basin in northeastern Utah (U.S. Geological Survey, 1996). The Glen Canyon Group encompasses the Jurassic Navajo Sandstone, Kayenta Formation, and Wingate Sandstone. These stratigraphic units consist mainly of clean, well-sorted eolian sandstones (Stanley and others, 1971; Kocurek and Dott, 1983; However, the Kayenta Formation contains sandstone with various amounts of siltstone, mudstone, claystone, and limestone (U.S. Geological Survey, 1996). The top seal is represented by the Carmel Formation, part of the Carmel-Twin Creek confining unit. The Carmel Formation, consisting of mudstone and evaporites, is present throughout the southwestern Colorado Plateau and the Sevier Basin (Wright and Dickey, 1963; Imlay, 1967; Kocurek and Dott, 1983).
Information Search and Selection
A wide variety of sources of aquifer data for the Glen Canyon Group include, in order of amount of information available, Freethey and Cordy (1991), Freethey and others (1988), The U.S. Geological Survey (1996), Hood and Danielson (1981), Hood and Patterson (1984), and Heilweil and Freethey (1992). Basic geologic data of the Navajo Sandstone and Carmel Formation were provided by Wright and Dickey (1963), Imlay (1967), Stanley and others (1971), Freeman and Visher (1975), Peterson and Pipiringos (1979), Taylor (1981), Blakey and others (1983), and Kocurek and Dott (1983). Major parameters for the Glen Canyon Group are briefly described, with notes pertaining to the suitability of this stratigraphic unit to be included as a data source.
References
Blakey, R. C., Peterson, F., Caputo, M. V., Voorhees, B. J., and Geesaman, R. C., 1983, Paleogeography of Middle Jurassic continental, shoreline and shallow marine sedimentation, southern Utah, in Reynolds, M. W., and Dolly, E. D., eds., Mesozoic paleogeography of the West-Central United States: Rocky Mountain paleogeography symposium: Denver, Rocky Mountain Section, Society of Economic Paleontologists and Mineralogists, March, v. 2, p. 77-100.
Freeman, W. E., and Visher, G. S., 1975, Stratigraphic analysis of the Navajo Sandstone: Journal of Sedimentology Petrology, v. 45, no. 3, p. 651-668.
Freethey, G. W., and Cordy, G. E., 1991, Geohydrology of Mesozoic rocks in the Upper Colorado River Basin-excluding the San Juan Basin-in Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming: U.S. Geological Survey, Professional Paper 1411-C, 118 p.
Freethey, G. W., Kimball, B. A., Wilberg, D. E., and Hood, J. W., 1988, General hydrogeology of the aquifers of Mesozoic age, upper Colorado River basin-excluding the San Juan Basin-Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, and Arizona: U.S. Geological Survey, Hydrologic Investigations Atlas HA-698, scale 1:2,500,000, 2 sheets.
Heilweil, V. M., and Freethey, G. W., 1992, Hydrology of the Navajo aquifer in southwestern Utah and northwestern Arizona, including computer simulation of ground-water flow and water-level declines that could be caused by proposed withdrawals, in Harty, K. M., ed., Engineering and environmental geology of southwestern Utah: Utah Geological Association Publication 21, p. 213-223.
Hood, J. W., and Danielson, T. W., 1981, Bedrock aquifers in the lower Dirty Devil River basin, Utah, with emphasis on the Navajo Sandstone: Utah Department of Natural Resources Technical Publication 68, 143 p.
Hood, J. W., and Patterson, D. J., 1984, Bedrock aquifers in the northern San Rafael Swell area, Utah, with special emphasis on the Navajo Sandstone: Utah Department of Natural Resources Technical Publication 78, 128 p.
Imlay, R. W., 1967, Twin Creek Limestone (Jurassic) in the Western Interior of the United States: U.S. Geological Survey, Professional Paper 540, 105 p.
Kocurek, G., and Dott, R. H., Jr., 1983, Jurassic paleogeography of the central and southern Rocky Mountains region, in Reynolds, M. W., and Dolly, E. D., eds., Mesozoic paleogeography of the West-Central United States: Rocky Mountain paleogeography symposium: Denver, Rocky Mountain Section, Society of Economic Paleontologists and Mineralogists, v. 2, p. 101-116.
Peterson, F., and Pipiringos, G. N., 1979, Stratigraphic relations of the Navajo Sandstone to Middle Jurassic formations, southern Utah and northern Arizona: U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 1035-B, p. B1-B43.
Richards, H. G., 1958, Cyclic deposition in the Jurassic Carmel Formation of eastern Utah: Journal of Sedimentary Petrology, v. 28, no. 1, p. 40-45.
Stanley, K. O., Jordan, W. M., and Dott, R. H., Jr., 1971, New hypothesis of early Jurassic paleogeography and sediment dispersal for western United States: American Association of Petroleum Geologists Bulletin, v. 55, no. 1, p. 10-19.
Taylor, D. W., 1981, Carbonate petrology and depositional environments of the limestone member of the Carmel Formation, near Carmel Junction, Kane County, Utah: Geology Studies, Brigham Young University, v. 28, no. 3, p. 117-133.
U.S. Geological Survey, 1996, Ground water atlas of the United States: Segment 2: Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah.
Wright, J. C., and Dickey, D. D., 1963, Relations of the Navajo and Carmel formations in Southwest Utah and adjoining Arizona: U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 450-E, p. E63-E67.
Prepared by William Ambrose.
