Saline County is located in southeastern Illinois. The geological boundaries of the area are the Cottage Grove fault on the north and the Shawneetown-Rough Creek fault on the south. The Pennsylvanian rocks are sandstone, shale, coal, and, locally, thin beds of limestone of the Caseyville, Tradewater, and Carbondale Groups. The coals are: Mt. Rorah and Wise Ridge of the Caseyville; Davis and Dekoven of the Tradewater; and the #2, #2A, #3, #4, #5, #5A, and #6 of the Carbondale. The Wise Ridge, Davis, Dekoven, #5, and #6 coals have been strip mined. The #5 and #6 have been deep mined. Extensive deep mining is planned in the near future for the Davis.

A drilling program has resulted in proving extensive Davis and Dekoven reserves for underground mining, and the #5 for both strip and underground mining.

The Pennsylvanian rocks are unconformably overlain by alluvium which reaches 120 ft (36 m) in thickness along the course of the Middle Fork of the Saline River.

Rock types, sedimentary structures, fossils, and electric-log characteristics indicate a succession of paludal marine-lagoonal, nonmarine, and river-channel deposits for the Davis-Dekoven interval. Evidence of depositional environments for the rest of the section is not conclusive.

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