ABSTRACT: Why Don't Migration Theories Work?

TOTH, JOZSEF, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada

Theories on basinal fluid flow and attendant petroleum migration abound. However, most of them, if not all, are based on empirical observations selected to fit preconceived ideas or on hypotheses poorly supported by factual evidence and, in addition, they are of little explicit use in the search for hydrocarbons. It may be argued that the reason for this sorry state of affairs is that some essential questions concerning basinal water flow and petroleum migration have still not been answered or even considered. Most important among these are: (1) What are the types, and what is the relative importance for migration, of the various fluid driving forces during the geologic evolutionary history of a petroliferous region? (2) What is the effective cross-formational permeability of areally xtensive aquitards and how does it depend on the time scale of particular flow problems? (3) What is/are the actual form/forms in which petroleum hydrocarbons migrate toward loci of accumulation? (4) What are the required and the available lengths of time for the creation and/or remigration of commercial-sized petroleum deposits during the geologic history of a petroliferous region? (5) What natural processes and phenomena are diagnostic indicators of petroleum migration and accumulation and may thus be used to aid exploration? The basic theses of this paper are (1) that current answers to these questions are very contentious, if offered at all; (2) that no practically useful migration models can be developed without unequivocal answers to them; and (3) that unequivocal answers to these uestions are possible if only research were open minded and relevant, industry-produced data accessible.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #91012©1992 AAPG Annual Meeting, Calgary, Alberta, Canada, June 22-25, 1992 (2009)