Summary

The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of oil occurrence and provenance for the 150,000 km² eastern Sirte Basin sub-province in petroleum system terms. In its entirety the basin cumulatively accounts for reserves in excess of 45 GBOR, these split equally between the western and eastern provinces. Primary reservoirs, hosting oils of variable waxiness, are found in Pre-Upper Cretaceous (Nubian) clastics and Paleogene carbonates. Geochemical procedures, including crude oil data inversion and multivariate analyses, source rock characterisation plus source to oil correlation, have been applied in the evolution of a Sirte Basin Oil Provenance Model. This permits recognition and quantification of a multiplicity of productive petroleum systems, some charged by unique sources. Elsewhere, dual-source hybrid systems (!!) are important in accounting for some of the more major reserves.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90928©1999 AAPG Annual Convention, San Antonio, Texas