Reply to comment on “Remírez, M.N. and Algeo, T.J., 2020. Paleosalinity determination in ancient epicontinental seas: A case study of the T-OAE in the Cleveland Basin (UK). Earth-Science Reviews, 201, 103072” by Stephen P. Hesselbo, Crispin T. S. Little, Micha Ruhl, Nicolas Thibault, and Clemens V. Ullmann

Abstract

We thank Stephen Hesselbo and his colleagues for their thoughtful Comment (henceforth, “Hetal-20”) on our article (Remírez and Algeo, 2020a, henceforth “R&A-20” as in their Comment), which provides us an opportunity to elaborate upon several key issues related to our study. R&A-20 presents evidence for a large decrease in salinity within the Cleveland Basin (U.K.) during the Toarcian Oceanic Anoxic Event (T-OAE). Our study is significant in (1) offering an alternative model to the existing paradigm for observed patterns of geochemical and paleobiological changes during the T-OAE, and (2) demonstrating the importance of applying a combination of salinity and redox proxies in analysis of paleoenvironmental variation in marginal-marine basins. We hope that R&A-20 stimulates further investigations of these issues.