ABSTRACT: Gas Resource Potential of the Canadian Cordillera

OSADETZ, KIRK G., P. J. LEE, and TIMOTHY D. BIRD, Institute of Sedimentary and Petroleum Geology, Geological Survey of Canada, Calgary, Alberta, Canada

The Eastern Marginal zone of the Western Canadian Cordillera covers an area approximately 1000 km long and is usually less than 200 km wide between the international boundary at Waterton and the Northwest Territories. Hydrocarbon seepages have been known in the area since the late 1880s and major gas reserves were first discovered in the Turner Valley field in 1914. Great effort has been expended defining structural style and outlining structures that provide exploration prospects for anticlinal traps, the primary exploration paradigm. Modern exploration began with the application of improved seismic methods and the discovery of significant Paleozoic gas reserves in the late 1940s. Subsequent exploration has built upon these successes.

Hydrocarbon play type and structural style are controlled primarily by progressive changes in the stratigraphic succession northward. The most important of these changes include the shale-out of Paleozoic carbonates and lower Mesozoic coarse clastic formations. Additional controls include basement structures of the ancestral North American cratonic margin. Of these the Peace River embayment and the Belt-Purcell basin are the most important. An assessment of natural gas resource potential in the Eastern Marginal zone forms part of a comprehensive overall assessment of gas resources in western Canada. The assessment procedure uses geological analysis of play types in a statistical evaluation of (1) undiscovered pool sizes within established plays, and (2) the potential of conceptual pla s. Once a play is defined the discovery time series forms the essential input to a Discovery Process Model. The potential of conceptual plays is predicted using an analogous technique using the play discovery time-series as an input. Numerical results of this analysis shall be released during the presentation of this paper.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #91017©1992 AAPG Rocky Mountain Section Meeting, Casper, Wyoming, September 13-16, 1992 (2009)