Hopedale Basin Exploration Potential, East Coast Atlantic Canada

Michaele E. Enachescu¹, Michelle Martin², Jordan Stead¹, Jeremy Hall¹, Andrew Carroll³, and Paul Einarsson^4
1Earth Sciences, Memorial University, St John's, NF, Canada
²BP Canada Energy, Calgary, AB, Canada
³Talisman Energy, Calgary, AB, Canada
⁴Geophysical Service Incorporated, Calgary, AB, Canada

The Hopedale Basin, in the Northern Atlantic has a complex history of Precambrian and Paleozoic deposition and orogenic events, peneplaning followed by new basin development during Mesozoic rifting and Tertiary thermal subsidence. The basin contains significant hydrocarbon potential within the Mesozoic sedimentary basins, as well as secondary source and reservoir rocks within the underlying Paleozoic formations. One giant gas field, the Bjarni-North Bjarni complex (3 Tcf), and several smaller discoveries resulted from an earlier phase of exploration in the Labrador Sea (1970s-early 1980s), has proved the existence of a viable petroleum system. As the exploration focus was for oil at that time, no field development has taken place. After a twenty-year break, exploration has returned to this region with the acquisition by Geophysical Service Incorporated of Calgary (GSI) of large non-exclusive reflection seismic and potential-field surveys. Over 30,000 km of modern 2D seismic regional and prospect data allows for a reevaluation study of Labrador margin geodynamic evolution and its petroleum systems. Time and depth structural maps suggest there is a much wider distribution of the Bjarni Formation, the main reservoir sandstone, extending on the outer shelf and deepwater slope regions. We will present results of an integrated geological and geophysical interpretation of the basin centered on the area where four large exploration blocks are slated for a 2008 Newfoundland and Labrador landsale.

AAPG Search and Discover Article #90078©2008 AAPG Annual Convention, San Antonio, Texas