--> ABSTRACT: Potential Extent of Subsalt and Deepwater Plays in the Gulf of Mexico, by J. S. Watkins; #91021 (2010)

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Potential Extent of Subsalt and Deepwater Plays in the Gulf of Mexico

WATKINS, JOEL S.

Regional mapping suggests that subsalt and deepwater plays in the Gulf of Mexico may be considerably more extensive than previously envisaged. In the salt play, the target reservoir sands are trapped beneath salt sheets. In addition to the well-known salt sheets of the middle and lower slope, remnants of a Miocene paleoslope sheet occur beneath the inner shelf of the northwest Louisiana and northeast Texas OCS, and remnants of four and possibly more Plio-Pleistocene slope sheets cover much of the present outer shelf from eastern Louisiana to central Texas. Local salt canopies distributed throughout the shelf and upper slope could also trap hydrocarbons.

In the deepwater play, Late Cretaceous and Paleogene sediment starvation in the eastern, central and southwest Gulf prevented maturation of kerogen-rich Early Cretaceous and Late Jurassic source rocks. A flood of Neogene turbidites buried the source rocks to maturation depths and simultaneously created excellent reservoirs. Samples of source rock and oils recovered from widely dispersed locations suggests that a belt of mature source rock lies beneath the continental rise and slope throughout the Gulf. Widespread salt mobilization created traps and migration pathways.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #91021©1997 AAPG Annual Convention, Dallas, Texas.