Michigan Basin Stratigraphy

Michigan Basin Stratigraphy

Have you ever wondered what’s beneath your feet? What if you could travel 3 miles underground?

You would find yourself surrounded by a 430 million-year-old network of coral reefs that once flourished throughout the Great Lakes region and then became buried by thousands of feet of salt; the result of a sudden environmental change. The disappearance of this enormous reef system represents a series of events that constitute the greater geologic history of the Michigan Basin.

The Michigan Basin is a bowl-shaped region in central North America that includes Michigan and its surrounding Great Lakes. The basin contains a sedimentary rock record of up to 5 km (16,000 ft) of strata that were deposited over 240 million years of time. This interval includes the appearance and disappearance of marine seaways, beaches, coral reefs, and desolate evaporative landscapes. During the past 170 years, Michiganders have come to realize the vast economic potential of this dynamic and inordinately thick sedimentary basin. They have also been actively engaged in the recovery of several types of renewable and nonrenewable resources. This includes several broad categories such as: solar, wind, fossil fuel, metal, and nonmetal resources.

The Michigan Basin exhibit will focus on generating a holistic understanding of its stratigraphy and rich economic history. Specifically, the exhibit will offer visitors the opportunity to view a:

• Large three-dimensional cut-away model (approximately 8 or 9 feet tall) of the Michigan Basin that exposes a scaled version of the relevant rock units, including coral reef networks and overlying salt deposits.
• Series of rock cores taken from major oil producing (and other) units, highlighting economically important intervals.
• Three-dimensional diorama that focuses on economic development in the basin (i.e. current and past renewable and non-renewable resources).

Costs

A total budget of $30,000 is projected to complete the design, construction, and maintenance phases of this project.

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