Modelling quartz cementation of quartzose sandstones

Cementation of quartzose sandstones is modelled assuming that the main source of silica is quartz dissolved at stylolites. The cementation process is shown to operate in one of two different regimes depending on the Damköhler number for diffusion. The regime, where diffusion of silica from the stylolites is a faster process than precipitation, is characterized by a nearly constant supersaturation between the stylolites. This regime, which spans the depth interval of quartz cementation for close stylolites, allows for approximate analytical expressions for the porosity evolution as a function of time and temperature. An expression is derived for the temperature where half the initial porosity is lost during constant burial along a constant thermal gradient. This expression is used to study the sensitivity of all parameters which enter the cementation process. The cementation process is shown to be particularly sensitive to the activation energy for quartz dissolution. The expression for the porosity decrease under constant burial is generalized to any piecewise linear burial and temperature history. The influence of the burial histories on the cementation process is then studied.