--> Abstract: Structural Architecture and Evolution of the Central Utah Thrust Belt: Implications for Hydrocarbon Exploration, by Daniel Schelling, Doug Strickland, Keith Johnson, John Vrona, David Wavrek, and Justin Reuter; #90039 (2005)

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Structural Architecture and Evolution of the Central Utah Thrust Belt: Implications for Hydrocarbon Exploration

Daniel Schelling1, Doug Strickland2, Keith Johnson3, John Vrona3, David Wavrek4, and Justin Reuter3
1 Structural Geology International, Salt Lake City, UT
2 Wolverine Gas & Oil Corp, Oklahoma City, OK
3 Wolverine Gas & Oil Corp, Grand Rapids,
4 Petroleum Systems International, Salt Lake City, UT

The recent discovery of the Covenant oil field along the deformation front of the Central Utah (Sevier) thrust belt has sparked renewed interest in the three-dimensional structural architecture, extensional and compressional structural geometries, and the structural evolution of the region. Along the Central Utah sector of the Idaho-Wyoming-Utah thrust belt, large-scale thrust sheets include the Canyon Range, Charleston-Nebo, Pavant, Paxton, and Gunnison-Salina thrust sheets, structural systems that were emplaced during Cretaceous through early Tertiary compressional deformation of an actively evolving foreland basin. Internal deformation within large-scale thrust sheets includes frontal and lateral duplexing and, in the vicinity of the deformation front, complex back-thrusting, tectonic-wedge formation and passive-roof duplexing, the latter assisted by ductile deformation within a thick, Jurassic-age, mixed evaporite-shale section of the Arapien Formation. The compressional deformation-front of the thin-skinned Sevier thrust belt in the Central Utah area is now recognized as being located along a Jurassic extensional fault system, and additional, pre-compressional extensional faults are believed to determine the locations of thrust-ramps and/or duplex systems along and within given thrust sheets. The east-vergent, compressional structural systems of the Central Utah thrust belt are overprinted by an Oligocene through Recent extensional tectonic event, related to adjacent Basin-and-Range development, that has broken original thrust sheets into compartmentalized extensional fault blocks. Successful hydrocarbon exploration within the Central Utah thrust belt will require focusing on original and late-stage migration pathways for oil and gas, related to Jurassic extensional faulting, Cretaceous thrust-sheet stacking, and Tertiary extensional faulting.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90039©2005 AAPG Calgary, Alberta, June 16-19, 2005