Warta Geologi, Vol. 46, No. 1, April 2020, pp. 12–16

Mineralogical analyses of Belata Black Shale, Perak,
Peninsular Malaysia

Esther Owusu Boateng¹, Haylay Tsegab
Gebretsadikab^1,2,*, Chow Weng Sum¹, Joel Ben Awuah³,
Eswaran Padmanabhan^1,2

¹ Dept. of Geoscience, Universiti Teknologi
PETRONAS, 32610 Bandar Seri Iskandar, Perak, Malaysia

² Southeast Asia Carbonate Research Laboratory,
Department of Geoscience, Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS, 32610 Bandar Seri
Iskandar, Perak, Malaysia

³ Department of Applied Geology, Curtin
University, Sarawak, Malaysia

* Corresponding author email address: besther2012@yahoo.com

Abstract:
Although Peninsular Malaysia comprises of 25% Paleozoic black shales, these
shales have very little published literatures on their mineralogical content.
This study employs the use of X-ray diffraction analyses to characterize the
mineralogical composition of the Belata Black shales. The findings of the study
indicate that the black shales of Belata Formation are dominated by felsic
minerals such as quartz and feldspars. Minerals such as muscovite, calcite,
pyrite, kaolinite and chlorite are also present, and this may indicate a felsic
source rock for the shales. The study of the source of sediments helps in
revealing the processes they have gone through and may together be used with
the weathering, transport, deposition and burial history of the sediment to
analyze their thermal maturity.

Keywords:
Mineralogy, black shales, Belata Formation, Xray diffraction

DOI :
https://doi.org/10.7186/wg461202003

ISSN
0126–5539; e-ISSN 2682-7549