GALICIA, JOSE , Pemex Exploration y Produccion, Region Norte, Mexico

The offshore portion of the Golden Lane has produced about 200 MMBOE from seven fields in the El Abra play. A new assessment from integrated geoscience studies reveals that an important volume of hydrocarbon remains undiscovered. Besides the El Abra, other plays such as the Tamabra and Miocene turbidites also have a high potential of undiscovered resources.

The famous Golden Lane Atoll is located along the east coast of Mexico forming part of the western boundary of the Gulf of Mexico. The geological setting for this tremendous reef complex is closely associated with the Tampico-Misantla sub-basin, in that, since the Jurassic, it has formed its eastern boundary separating these deposits from the open Gulf.

The Tuxpan Cretaceous Platform, that defines the Golden Lane reef trend, was a calcareous restricted shelf built on ancestral basement high where typical platform environments were developed. Common to this type of palorelief, biothermal reef development, with back-reef, reef plain and crestal reef facies, create the producing reservoirs that rim the Tuxpan Platform. The produced fluid (light oil 34 to 39 degrees API) is recovered from an active spontaneous flowing reservoir with a natural water drive sufficient to sustain a forty-percent recovery factor.

Recently, the offshore Golden Lane has been the object of an important exploratory re-activation program. The main focus of this effort has been the acquisition of a three-dimensional seismic survey. With this 3D seismic data set, several active opportunities have been detected using a short-term strategic work program, involving closely integrated geological and geophysical analysis.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90908©2000 GCAGS, Houston, Texas