Deposits of 10 volcanic events of 6 stages have been discovered by the authors after detailed field and lab studies of the Benxi and Taiyuan Formations in Shandong Province and its adjacent regions. They show certain temporalspatial distribution characteristics. Volcanic fragments were probably derived from two different volcanic sources north and south of the North China Platform, while the magma of the two volcanic sources was probably derived from the lower crust. A new stratigraphic correlation scheme is put forward for the Benxi and Taiyuan Formations iii this region on the basis of previous biostratigraphic work with the regionally widespread volcanic event layers as the marker bed for the isochronous stratigraphic correlation on a superregional scale and in conjunction with the maximum transgressive event layers.
Four great second‐order transgressions occurred during the Late Carboniferous to early Early Permian and they came from both the eastern and western sea areas in the North China Platform. As time went on, depocentres, depositional extent, transgression directions, coastline position and distribution of minable coal seams were changing continuously. The third great second‐order transgression occurring at the beginning of the early Early Permian marks the maximum transgression period and before its arrival, i.e. at the close of the late Late Carboniferous, there was the super‐regional coal‐forming environment. During the second, third and fourth transgressions, the northern North China Platform was all along situated on the transgressive margin of the epicontinental sea and became the major distribution area of thick coal belts because it maintained a coal‐forming environment for a long period of time from the close of the late Late Carboniferous to the Early Permian.
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