Petroleum Systems and Play Analysis

Course Overview:

This course is designed for geoscientists keen to develop skills in play analysis and basin modelling. It reviews global basin types, looking at both successful and unsuccessful exploration campaigns from around the world, their success ratio and the dominant play types. The course then reviews the workflow to assess a new basin, key input data and techniques used to characterise the petroleum systems and plays, and ultimately develop leads and prospects

It is aimed at honing the analytical skills to evaluate petroleum systems and their hydrocarbon potential, and to learn from examining global analogues. It reviews the important control that basin formation and mechanisms have on the petroleum system, examining subsidence, heat flow, structural style, evolution and sedimentation. Global examples of typical basin types are examined with emphasis on the impact that basin style and sedimentation have on the hydrocarbon habitat and prospectivity. Within each basin, depositional systems are reviewed, and the control on reservoir, source, seal and trap are discussed.

WHAT YOU WILL LEARN

• Plate tectonics and mechanisms of subsidence
• Basin formation and basin classification
• Basin analysis techniques (interpretation of seismic and well data)
• Review of basin by type:
  - Extensional / rift basins
  - Compressional / foreland basins
  - Passive margin basins
  - Arc type basins
  - Strike slip basins
• For each basin type the following is reviewed:
• Structure / tectonic evolution and controls on depositional style
• Role of tectonics, climate and eustacy
• Typical facies suites and sedimentary environments
• Typical seismic expression
• Analogue petroleum systems and plays

• Stratigraphy and correlations
• Subsidence history
• Basin modelling
• Building plays and learning from global analogues
• Critical Elements Charts and Chronostratigraphic Charts
• Gross Depositional Element Mapping
• Common Risk Segment Mapping

• Focusing on the influence basin formation mechanism has on subsequent petroleum systems, how the mechanism of formation controls the structural style and sedimentary fill
• How to recognise different basin types from typical seismic and well log data
• Key controls including tectonics, climate and eustacy
• Petroleum systems active on a number of global basins
• Case studies of basin plays, how new play types have been developed that have rejuvenated basins, and the flaws of chasing the wrong play, or a step too far
• Key techniques to analyse sedimentary basins including
  - Source rock characterisation, organic matter types, global source distribution
  - Analysis of different data types to generate key input data for maturity and migration modelling
  - Hydrocarbon types and distribution
  - Controls on migration
  - Becoming familiar with basin models and the input data required
  - Calibrating basin models
  - Understanding uncertainty and sensitivity of the models
  - Introduction to techniques to analyse the petroleum system
  - Seals – fault and formation seals
  - Reservoirs
  - Trapping styles
  - How to produce Gross Depositional Element Maps
  - Common Risk Segment Mapping