--> Abstract: Petroleum Distribution and Recent Discoveries of Latin America, by Zhang, Lei; Zhang, Guangya; #90163 (2013)

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Petroleum Distribution and Recent Discoveries of Latin America

Zhang, Lei; Zhang, Guangya

There are mainly six kinds of petroliferous basins in Latin America, which are fore-arc basins, fold belt basins, back-arc basins, back-arc foreland basins, craton basins, passive continental margin basins, respectively. Petroleum is mainly concentrated in back-arc foreland basins and passive continental margin basins. The three main petroleum enrichment belts in latin America are sub-Andean back-arc foreland basins, east Brazil offshore passive continental margin basins and surrounding Gulf of Mexico foreland and passive continental margin basins. About 95 percent of discovered recoverable reserve of Latin America are concentrated in these three belts. Petroleum are enriched in Cretaceous and Tertiary strata. Sub-Andean back-arc foreland basins' petroleum is mainly concentrated in Miocene strata. East Brazil offshore passive continental margin basins' petroleum is mainly concentrated in Aptian. Surrounding Gulf of Mexico foreland and passive continental margin basins' petroleum is mainly concentrated in Paleocene.

By December 2012, the top ten basins with most newly-discovered fields since 2000 are Neuquen basin(204), Llanos-Barinas basin(150), Gulf Coast basin(144), Sureste basin(88), Austral (Magallanes) basin(86), Campos basin(70), Potiguar basin(67), Santos basin(60), Espirito Santo basin(60) and Veracruz basin(41). The top ten basins with most newly-discovered recoverable reserves since 2000 are Santos basin(40.92 BBOE), Campos basin(10.58 BBOE), Sureste basin(4.43 BBOE), Espirito Santo basin(3.22 BBOE), Trinidad basin(2.83 BBOE), Chaco basin(2.76 BBOE), Ucayali basin(1.75 BBOE), Llanos-Barinas basin(1.49 BBOE), Neuquen basin(1.03 BBOE) and North Falkland basin(0.49 BBOE). We could see that both newly-discovered fields and recoverable reserves are concentrated in passive continental margin basins and back-arc foreland basins, especially in passive continental margin basins.

 

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90163©2013AAPG 2013 Annual Convention and Exhibition, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, May 19-22, 2013