PRELIMINARY GEOCHEMICAL ANALYSIS OF THE MARCELLUS FORMATION IN NEW YORK STATE

This project was undertaken as part of a larger study, targeted at the correlation between water and rock chemistry in central upstate New York. Ideally, we want to determine a chemical fingerprint for a specific rock unit and find that fingerprint in the water that drains from that rock unit. If successful, the project could provide a tool to pinpoint a formation source of groundwater, and could serve as a database from which to test groundwater flow and geochemical reaction models. We focused on the Marcellus formation in New York State where the formation outcrops at Earth’s surface. We gathered information on both the mineralogy via x-ray diffraction for ten samples and elemental chemical composition via mass spectrometry on seven samples. Sample collection was dictated somewhat by outcrop availability, but we tried to collect samples that span the formation from top to bottom.Funding limitations also restricted more extensive sampling. X-ray diffraction results show that most samples were dominantly illite, chlorite, and quartz, with a few samples also showing calcite. We had seven samples analyzed at Activation Laboratories using a lithium metaborate/tetraborate fusion ICP method for whole rock analyses and ICP/MS for trace elements. For each sample, 55 elemental concentrations were determined, of which 46 elements were common to all. We present these results, and hope to perform initial comparisons with water geochemistry from local wells and springs.