Maceral Composition of Coals From Carboniferous Coalfields of the East European Platform

The Lower and Middle Carboniferous deposits of the European part of Russia are coal-bearing in many regions, so their study and exploration began in 19th century. Such basins as the Donetsk, Podmoskovny, Kamsky, Kizelovsky, and Lviv-Volyn basins located in Ukraine are well known. The aim of this study was to re-examine the maceral composition taking into account the modern terminology of the International Committee for Coal and Organic Petrology, as well as to reconstruct the paleogeographic areas in which the coal formation of the studied basins took place. Maceral composition of coals of all mentioned basins and some coaloccurrences of the East European Platform (EEP) from the collections in Lomonosov Moscow State University and Geological Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences were examined. The modern International Nomenclature was used for the first time for coals of different Russian European basins. Two facial zones were distinguished according to coal macerals composition, which are in agreement with early described paleogeography reconstructions and lithological analysis. The first zone is widely spread in the inner part of the Platform, it is represented by alluvial and lake facies (Podmoskovny, Kamsky basins) and in the peripheral region (Kizelovsky) delta fancies are marked out. This area is characterized by coals with very diverse maceral composition, mixtohumolites (Russian term) are frequent, and among the liptinite group alginites – representatives of sapropelic organic matter – are not uncommon. The second zone, identified by coal petrographic data, is the southern and western margins of the EEP, where coal-bearing is represented in a wider stratigraphic interval, and is associated with coastal-marine conditions. The main coal-forming component of the coals of these basins are macerals of the vitrinite group, which account for at least 80%. Alginites are also found in the maceral composition of Donetsk and Lviv-Volyn basins. The abundance of macrosporinites and other liptinites formed from the ancient higher plants is considered to be a common feature of coals of both zones.

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