Carbonate Platform Systems

This volume arises from the NATO Advanced Research Workshop (ARW) on 'North African Cretaceous rudist and coral formations and their contributions to carbonate platform development , which was held in Tunisia, on 13-18 May, 2002. It was convened by M. El Hedi Negra (Universite 7 Novembre de Carthage, now Universite de Tunis El Manar, Tunisia) and Eulalia Gili (Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona, Spain). The aims of the ARW were: (1) to review and critically assess currently available data on rudist/coral formations in North African Cretaceous carbonate platforms, and their correlations, and to integrate these data with other studies around the Mediterranean; (2) to place the findings in a global context, noting both similarities with other regions of platform development as well as local differences, and (3) exploring possible reasons for these; and to help promote the creation of a vibrant peri-Mediterranean collaborative research community, embracing researchers from the entire region, to carry forward this ambitious research programme. Twenty-two presentations (oral and poster) provided both topical reviews (covering rudist evolution, and ecology, mineralogical changes, applications of strontium isotope, and graphic correlation methods, and platform typology) as well as regional syntheses (Tunisian reservoirs, Moroccan platform history, Tunisian platforms and rudist/coral facies, Algerian platforms, and Egyptian platforms). Fifteen of these presentations are expanded here as papers. The workshop was attended by 24 academic staff, 4 geologists from the oil industry, plus several observers and students.

This volume also discusses the computer modelling of carbonate cycles and sequence analysis. This will prove an invaluable text for senior undergraduate and postgraduate students in the earth sciences in general and will also be of value to the professional researcher. Carbonate platforms contains contributions from an international authorship and the volume has been edited by one of the most respected names in the earth sciences. Areas covered include; early rifting deposition; examples from carbonate sequences of Sardinia (Cambrian) and Tuscany (Triassic-Jurassic), Italy; geometry and evolution of platform-margin bioclastic shoals, late Dinantian (Mississippian), Derbyshire, UK; cyclic sedimentation in cabonate and mixed carbonate/clastic environments; four simulation programs for a desktop computer; middle Triassic carbonate ramp systems in the Catalan Basis, N.E. Spain; facies, cycles, depositional sequencies and controls; stages in the evolution of late Triassic and Jurassic platform carbonates; western margin of the Subalpine basin, Ardech, France. The formation and drowning of isolated carbonate platforms; tectonic and ecologic control of the Northern Apennines; controls on Upper Jurassic carbonate build up development in the Lusitanian Basin, Portugal; Hauterivian to Lower Aptian carbonate shelf sedimentation and sequence stratigraphy in the Jura and northern Subalpine chains (southeastern France and Swiss Jura); basement structural controls on Mesozoic carbonate facies in northeastern Mexico; the Aptian-Albian carbonate episode of the Basque-Cantabrian Basis (Northern Spain); general characteristics, controls and evolution; response of the Arabian carbonate platform margin slope to orogenic closing of an ocean basin, Cretaceous, Oman.

Hardcover plus Foldouts

The Cenozoic carbonate systems of Australasia are the product of a diverse assortment of depositional and post-depositional processes, reflecting the interplay of eustasy, tectonics (both plate and local scale), climate, and evolutionary trends that influenced their initiation and development. These systems, which comprise both land-attached and isolated platforms, were initiated in a wide variety of tectonic settings (including rift, passive margin, and arc-related) and under warm and cool-water conditions where, locally, siliciclastic input affected their development. The lithofacies, biofacies, growth morphology, diagenesis, and hydrocarbon reservoir potential of these systems are products of these varying influences. The studies reported in this volume range from syntheses of tectonic and depositional factors influencing carbonate deposition and controls on reservoir formation and petroleum system development, to local studies from the South China Sea, Indonesia, Kalimantan, Malaysia, the Marion Plateau, the Philippines, Western Australia, and New Caledonia that incorporate outcrop and subsurface data, including 3-D seismic imaging of carbonate platforms and facies, to understand the interplay of factors affecting the development of these systems under widely differing circumstances. This volume will be of importance to geoscientists interested in the variability of Cenozoic carbonate systems and the factors that controlled their formation, and to those wanting to understand the range of potential hydrocarbon reservoirs discovered in these carbonates and the events that led to favorable reservoir and trap development.

In recent years there has been a virtual explosion of stratigraphic studies utilizing the principles of sequence stratigraphy. Although the concept of time stratigraphy is not new, the packaging of depositional units into systems tracts and sequences is. This new approach has led to the reassessment of areas that in some cases have been the subject of intense geological scrutiny for decades. The fundamental principles upon which sequence stratigraphy is based are applicable at a broad range of temporal and physical scales. This volume arises from several sessions on sequence stratigraphy held at the Thirteenth International Sedimentological Congress, with emphasis on facies associations within a sequence stratigraphic framework.

Modern seismic data have become an essential toolkit for studying carbonate platforms and reservoirs in impressive detail. Whilst driven primarily by oil and gas exploration and development, data sharing and collaboration are delivering fundamental geological knowledge on carbonate systems, revealing platform geomorphologies and how their evolution on millennial time scales, as well as kilometric length scales, was forced by long-term eustatic, oceanographic or tectonic factors. Quantitative interrogation of modern seismic attributes in carbonate reservoirs permits flow units and barriers arising from depositional and diagenetic processes to be imaged and extrapolated between wells. This volume reviews the variety of carbonate platform and reservoir characteristics that can be interpreted from modern seismic data, illustrating the benefits of creative interaction between geophysical and carbonate geological experts at all stages of a seismic campaign. Papers cover carbonate exploration, including the uniquely challenging South Atlantic pre-salt reservoirs, seismic modelling of carbonates, and seismic indicators of fluid flow and diagenesis.