Thickness change involved in the peat-to-coal transformation for a bituminous coal of Cretaceous age in central Utah

Abstract

Abstract The ratio of the thicknesses of a layer of peat and the coal bed formed from that peat has been calculated for a bituminous coal bed in central Utah. The method used involves comparison of the thickness of peat eroded by a laterally migrating channel system with the thickness of coal now absent from the outcrop. The peat:coal thickness ratio calculated by this method is approximately 11:1.