The sulfate carbonates are a compound carbonates, or mixed anion compounds that contain sulfate and carbonate ions. Sulfate carbonate minerals are in the 7.DG and 5.BF Nickel-Strunz groupings.[1]
They may be formed by crystallization from a water solution, or by melting a carbonate and sulfate together.
In some structures carbonate and sulfate can substitute for each other. For example a range from 1.4 to 2.2 Na2SO4•Na2CO3 is stable as a solid solution.[2] Silvialite can substitute about half its sulfate with carbonate[3] and the high temperature hexagonal form of sodium sulfate (I) Na2SO4 can substitute unlimited proportions of carbonate instead of sulfate.[4]
^Green, Stanley J.; Frattali, Francis J. (September 1946). "The System Sodium Carbonate-Sodium Sulfate-Sodium Hydroxide-Water at 100°". Journal of the American Chemical Society. 68 (9): 1789–1794. doi:10.1021/ja01213a033.