Physiochemical and Mineralogical Investigations of Some Raw Materials in Wadi Abou Al Gomel Area, Eastern Region, Libya

Abstract

This study was conducted on Wadi Abou Al Gomel area through three selected sites, namely: (1), (2) and (3), in the east of Libya along the coast Mediterranean Sea, between N32°03’00 N32°08'30 and E23°45' 00 E23°52'00. The area comprises two main formations which  are Al Khowaymat and Al Faidiyah that belonging to Tertiary age. The lithology of rocks is mainly limestone, dolomite and marly limestone and argillaceous rocks represented by shale. The objective of this study is to highlight rocks physically, chemically and minerlogically as well as the assessment as raw materials for cement manufacturing. The chemical results revealed that the major oxides exhibit a variation of distribution and the major oxide is CaO to reach 55.15% which meets the requirements of cement industry. According to the physical properties of the studied samples, they can be classified into two categories which are hard rocks and very hard rocks. The mineralogical investigations revealed that the carbonate rocks arise in different environments, aragonite and high-magnesium calcite usually occur in the warm, shallow marine environments by direct precipitation from seawater or from skeletons of various organisms. Dolomite among the bulk minerals in the Oligocene-Miocene successions indicates variation in the sedimentation regime from shallow marine shelf transgression to slightly regressive intertidal. Gypsum percentages ranged between 2 and 5%, while halite occurred in low amounts varied from 1 to 4% in both Al Khowaymat and Al Faidiyah formations. This reflects supratidal to intertidal environment marked by evaporation.