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Red Sea Geothermal Brine Deposits: Their Mineralogy, Chemistry, and Genesis

  • Chapter
Hot Brines and Recent Heavy Metal Deposits in the Red Sea

Abstract

Chemical and mineralogical analyses were performed on samples from ten specially selected cores from the Red Sea geothermal deposit. The deposit was divided into seven bedded and laterally correlative facies as follows:

  1. (1)

    detrital

  2. (2)

    iron-montmorillonite

  3. (3)

    goethite-amorphous

  4. (4)

    sulfide

  5. (5)

    manganosiderite

  6. (6)

    anhydrite

  7. (7)

    manganite

Distribution of the facies, their unconsolidated nature and age relations indicate that the solids were precipitated out of the overlying brine column, that the area of brine discharge is very local within the Atlantis II Deep, and that the chemistry of the brine has changed considerably with time.

Mechanisms of precipitation include simple cooling of subterranean brine as it discharges into the bottom of the Atlantis II Deep and mixing of the brine with the overlying sea water.

Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Contribution No. 2198.

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Author notes

  1. James L. Bischoff

    Present address: Dept. of Geological Sciences, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, USA

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Woods Hole, Massachusetts, USA

    James L. Bischoff

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  1. James L. Bischoff
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemistry, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Woods Hole, Massachusetts, USA

    Egon T. Degens

  2. Department of Geology and Geophysics, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Woods Hole, Massachusetts, USA

    David A. Ross

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Bischoff, J.L. (1969). Red Sea Geothermal Brine Deposits: Their Mineralogy, Chemistry, and Genesis. In: Degens, E.T., Ross, D.A. (eds) Hot Brines and Recent Heavy Metal Deposits in the Red Sea. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-28603-6_37

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-28603-6_37

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-662-27120-9

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-662-28603-6

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