New Mapping of the World-Class Jinding Zn-Pb Deposit, Lanping Basin, Southwest China: Genesis of Ore Host Rocks and Records of Hydrocarbon-Rock Interaction

Jinding is the third-largest known Mississippi Valley-type (MVT) Zn-Pb deposit. It is hosted by a dome containing a suite of complex breccias and sandstones with abundant gypsum and anhydrite. This study presents the results of new geologic mapping of the Jinding open pit and discusses the geology of the deposit in detail. Our new data support a previously proposed model where the deposit is hosted in an evaporite dome created by the diapiric migration of Late Triassic evaporites during Paleocene thrust loading. Nearly all of the mineralization in the deposit is hosted by evaporite diapir-related rocks, including diapiric breccias and laterally extruded material mixed with fluvial sandy sediments (limestone clast-bearing sandstones) and overlying gypsum-sand diapiric units (mainly clast-free sandstones). The new mapping determined that the currently light gray colored sandstones within the Jinding dome were originally red, with the bleaching being a response to calcite and pyrite alteration as a result of pre-ore interaction with hydrocarbons. The bleached sandstones host sphalerite and galena that replaced calcite, and Zn-Pb sulfides also occur in limestone breccias and gypsum-rich rocks as a result of replacement and open space-filling mineralizing processes. The Jinding deposit demonstrates that MVT Zn-Pb mineralization can be hosted by a variety of evaporite diapir-related rocks and indicates that dome structures and the presence of pre-ore hydrocarbons are both important for the formation of Zn-Pb mineralization.