One of the most known sedimentary rocks in the world is Limestone. It is a composition out of calcite one of the calcium carbonate minerals. It also need to form in shallow, soothed, warm and clear marine waters.
What is Limestone? | limestone uses
This type of environment is where organisms capable of forming calcium carbonate skeletons or shells can easily extract the needed ingredients from ocean water. commonly limestone is a biological sedimentary rock, formed out of the organic debris like accumulation of shell, coral, algal, fecal, and etc. After the animals die, the remain of their shell and skeletal debris accumulate as a sediment that have the potential to turn into limestone. also Their waste products can contribute to the sediment masses and help the process.
Biological limestones mostly contain significant amounts of directly precipitated calcium carbonate. When the biological grains have buried and accumulated, water that is saturated with dissolved materials will slowly move through the sediment masses. the Calcium carbonate that precipitated directly out of solution, forms as “cement” that mixes the biological grains together. This last step of the process also known as “Cementation” is very important because if the biological grains are not bind together, a rock will not be formed.
Another way of limestone formation is by chemical sedimentary processes, like as the precipitation of calcium carbonate from lake or ocean waters, meaning that they are formed by direct precipitation of calcium carbonate out of fresh waters. This type are chemical sedimentary rocks and they are less abundant and tougher than biological limestones.
Forming Environments
Most of the limestone-forming environments on earth are still active and can be found in shallow parts of the ocean. We can name some of these places like the Caribbean Sea, Indian Ocean, Persian Gulf, Gulf of Mexico, around Pacific Ocean islands, and within the Indonesian archipelago.
Cave Limestones
limestone uses |Another way of having limestone is very interesting and through evaporation. Stalactites, stalagmites, and other cave formations are examples of limestone that formed by evaporation. This is how, droplets of water should seep down from above the cave through fractures or in the cave ceiling. There they might evaporate before falling to the cave floor.
As the water evaporates, any calcium carbonate that was dissolved in the water will deposit. When time passes this process can make an accumulation of icicle-shaped calcium carbonate on the caves ceiling. These types of stones are known as stalactites. If droplets fall on the ground and then evaporate there, stalagmites could grow upwards from the cave floor. These limestones that are made in the caves; are known as “travertine,” a very famous chemical sedimentary rock. Also “tufa” is a another limestone formed by evaporation but at a hot spring or on the shoreline of a lake in an arid area.
Types of Limestone
limestone uses |There are various types of limestone and each of them have their own names. All the names are mostly based on the rocks formation, its appearance, its composition or even its physical properties. Below we name and introduce some of the most common ones:
- Chalk
chalk can form from the calcareous remains of some marine algae. It also can form from accumulation of calcareous shell remains of microscopic marine organisms such as foraminifera. Chalk is a friable limestone and has a fine texture. It can easily be crushed and powdered. Its color is usually white or light shades of gray.
- Travertine
Travertine is one of the famous variety of limestone. Generally, where geothermally heated alkaline waters highly charged with dissolved gases or minerals emerge at the surface, it forms travertine stones. At this point as the water degases and its evaporation, calcium carbonate and other minerals precipitate. Another way to have travertine, is where waters emerge into subsurface caverns. duo to the rapid precipitation, travertine is a rock with numerous voids and cavities and it forms on younger materials. There, as cave formations such as stalactites, stalagmites, and flowstone they precipitate. The pure travertine is in white color, but most of the time because of the presence of other minerals it can be seen in other colors like cream, tan, greenish, brownish and etc.
- Tufa
Tufa is a porous limestone that forms out of precipitation of calcium carbonate from waters of a hot spring or other parts of surface water that can precipitate volumes of calcium carbonate. The pore space texture in tufa is the result of plant material trapped in precipitating process of calcium carbonate. Even with its gnarly and rugged appearance, tufa has many uses in architectural. When tufa is in thick accumulations, it can be mined and sawn into blocks or sheets like any other dimension stone.
limestone uses | Uses of Limestone
- limestone uses |Limestone is a rock with diverse uses. Most limestones are made into crushed stone to use in road bases, railroads, foundation stones, drain fields, concrete aggregates and other constructional purposes. To make cement out of it, it should be fired in a kiln with crushed shale.
- Limestone is often cut into blocks or slabs with specific dimensions to use in construction and architectural projects. It can be used for both interior and exterior designs such as facade, floor tiles, stair treads, window sills some other purposes. Fine particle size crushed limestones can be used as a heat-resistant coating on asphalt-impregnated shingles and roofing
- Some kind of crushed limestone, can be used in smelting or some other metal refining processes. In the heat of smelting, limestone combines with impurities and can be removed from the process as slag.
When limestone is heated in a kiln with shale, sand and some other materials and then grounded to a powder that will harden after being mixed with water, it makes Portland Cement.
Limestone is not available all over the world. It can only exist in areas underlined with sedimentary rocks. When limestone is needed in other places, buyers will pay high amount of money to have limestone in their project or process.
Econature as a wholesaler of natural stone have long been a leader in this field which is based in New South Wales. And, both decorative and building stones consisting Travertine, Marble, Granite and limestone and basalt are offered by it across Australia.
