The Döhlen Basin (german: Döhlener Becken) is a landscape unit in the German federal state of

Saxony Saxony (german: Sachsen ; Upper Saxon: ''Saggsn''; hsb, Sakska), officially the Free State of Saxony (german: Freistaat Sachsen, links=no ; Upper Saxon: ''Freischdaad Saggsn''; hsb, Swobodny stat Sakska, links=no), is a landlocked state of ...

, southwest of

Dresden Dresden (, ; Upper Saxon: ''Dräsdn''; wen, label=Upper Sorbian, Drježdźany) is the capital city of the German state of Saxony and its second most populous city, after Leipzig. It is the 12th most populous city of Germany, the fourth larg ...

. The Döhlen Basin has a length of 22 km and a width of 6 km and lies within the district of

Sächsische Schweiz-Osterzgebirge Saxon Switzerland-Eastern Ore Mountains (german: Sächsische Schweiz-Osterzgebirge) is a district (''Districts of Germany, Kreis'') in Saxony, Germany. It is named after the mountain ranges Saxon Switzerland and Eastern Ore Mountains. History Th ...

Description

In the centre of the basin is the large county town of

Freital Freital is a town in the district of Sächsische Schweiz-Osterzgebirge in Saxony, Germany. The town is situated on a small river, the Weißeritz, and is southwest of Dresden. Geography Freital is located southwest of Dresden in the Döhlen Ba ...

; although the basin is named after Döhlen, one of the villages in its borough. The highest point in the area is the Lerchenberg near Possendorf at 425 m above sea level (NN); the lowest point is in the river valley of the

Weißeritz The Weißeritz (also: ''Vereinigte Weißeritz'' in German i.e. United Weißeritz, ''Bystrica'' in Sorbian) is a river of Saxony, Germany. It is long and a left tributary of the Elbe. The river is formed by the confluence of the Wild Weißeritz ...

at 160 m above NN. The Karsdorf fault forms the geological boundary with the

Eastern Ore Mountains The Eastern Ore Mountains (german: Osterzgebirge) form a natural region of Saxony that covers the eastern part (in area almost the eastern half) of the Saxon Ore Mountains range. Together with the Western and Central Ore Mountains, it is part of ...

to the south. The formation and

sedimentation Sedimentation is the deposition of sediments. It takes place when particles in suspension settle out of the fluid in which they are entrained and come to rest against a barrier. This is due to their motion through the fluid in response to the ...

of the basin lasted from

Upper Carboniferous Upper may refer to: * Shoe upper or ''vamp'', the part of a shoe on the top of the foot * Stimulant Stimulants (also often referred to as psychostimulants or colloquially as uppers) is an overarching term that covers many drugs including those ...

to the

Lower Permian The Cisuralian is the first series/epoch of the Permian. The Cisuralian was preceded by the Pennsylvanian and followed by the Guadalupian. The Cisuralian Epoch is named after the western slopes of the Ural Mountains in Russia and Kazakhstan and ...

and were

tectonically Tectonics (; ) are the processes that control the structure and properties of the Earth's crust and its evolution through time. These include the processes of mountain building, the growth and behavior of the strong, old cores of continents k ...

affected by the adjacent NW-SE trending fault zone (the Elbe Valley zone). About half of the 800-metre-thick basin filling is made of

pyroclastic rock Pyroclastic rocks (derived from the el, πῦρ, links=no, meaning fire; and , meaning broken) are clastic rocks composed of rock fragments produced and ejected by explosive volcanic eruptions. The individual rock fragments are known as pyrocl ...

. Of economic importance were the

coal seam Coal mining is the process of extracting coal from the ground. Coal is valued for its energy content and since the 1880s has been widely used to generate electricity. Steel and cement industries use coal as a fuel for extraction of iron from ...

s of the Döhlen formation, whose occurrence has been known since the 16th century and particularly in the late 19th and early 20th century was the reason for an intensive mining industry. From 1968,

mining Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the Earth, usually from an ore body, lode, vein, seam, reef, or placer deposit. The exploitation of these deposits for raw material is based on the economic via ...

activity became restricted to the extraction of

uranium Uranium is a chemical element with the symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Uranium is weak ...

-bearing

coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal is formed when dea ...

on the northwest edge of the Döhlen Basin by

SDAG Wismut SAG/SDAG Wismut was a uranium mining company in East Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populo ...

. Since 1989, the surface and underground facilities in the region have been safeguarded and sanitised.

References

* Sächsisches Landesamt für Umwelt und Geologie /

Sächsisches Oberbergamt The Saxon Mining Office (german: Sächsisches Oberbergamt) is the executive authority for mining rights in the German state of Saxony. It is also responsible for all non-metallic mineral resources on the terrain of the former East Germany. Histo ...

ub. ''Das Döhlener Becken bei Dresden. Geologie und Bergbau.'' Dresden 2007.
digitalised (pdf file, 44 MB)

External links

S. Janetz & S. Stute: Das Döhlener Becken - Geschichte einer Landschaft ("The Döhlen Basin - History of a Landscape")
Basins of Germany Geology of Germany Mining in Saxony Natural regions of Saxony Freital {{ore-mountains-stub

Description

See also

References

External links