--> Abstract: Petroleum Systems in the Shelf of the East Siberian Sea, by Alexander Savitsky; #90177 (2013)

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Petroleum Systems in the Shelf of the East Siberian Sea

Alexander Savitsky

Integrated interpretation of the newly acquired seismic data helped study structure of the shelf sedimentary cover in the East Siberian Sea; identify major negative structures the Novosibirsk and North Chukchi Basins; describe speculative petroleum systems; evaluate generation potential of the pods and make comparative evaluation of potential resources. Hydrocarbon resources of the East Siberian Sea depend on generation potential of petroleum sys-tems within Melville, Dreamhead and North Chukchi Pods which differ in size and age of petro-leum systems. Melville Pod (occupying 79871 km2) comprises three troughs that consist of Aptian-Cenozoic deposits with maximum thickness over 10 km. Modeling allows identifying one Cretaceous (?) or Cretaceous-Cenozoic (?) petroleum system. The pod started to form during Late Cretaceous in the depocenter of the Melville Trough; the unified extensive pod appeared during Oligocene. At the present time, HCs are mainly supplied by Cretaceous source rocks. Pod generation potential is assessed at 120-123 billion tons with average generation density around 1.5 million tons of HC/km2. Dreamhead Pod with area of 11 980 km2 is confined to the Dreamhead Rift composed of Upper Jurassic-Cenozoic deposits with aggregate thickness over 11 km. One Upper Jurassic-Cretaceous (?) petroleum system is identified in this part of the shelf. Dreamhead Pod formed during Late Jurassic-Barremian time; its structure changed during tectogenesis phase in the Late Cretaceous time. Oil window in the non-inverted part of the pod contains source rocks of Upper Cretaceous and Aptian-Albian subsequences, while gas window comprises source rocks of Upper Jurassic-Barremian, Aptian and Aptian-Albian sequences. Pod generation potential is estimated at 35-40 billion tons with average generation density varying from 2.9 to 3.3 million tons of HC/km2. North Chukchi Pod is composed of Lower Carboniferous-Cenozoic deposits with maximum thickness up to 24 km. Three speculative petroleum systems are identified in the North Chukchi Trough (Gretskaya, Savitsky, 2010). The pod occupies 40 800 km2 of the shelf area in the East Siberian Sea. The pod stably evolved starting from the Middle Jurassic. Source rocks of lower petroleum systems produced about 95-100 billion tons of HCs that were able to migrate to the traps in the overlying sequences. Greater volume of potential HC resources in the shelf is associated with the North Chukchi Pod.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90177©3P Arctic, Polar Petroleum Potential Conference & Exhibition, Stavanger, Norway, October 15-18, 2013