Curie point depth from airborne magnetic data analysis for geothermal exploration in southern Thailand

Abstract

Southern Thailand is a high heat flow region, which implies to high-potential area of geothermal resources. Direct heat flow measurements are only available from petroleum wells in Gulf of Thailand. Therefore, indirect method of Curie Point Depth (CPD) calculation has been used to evaluate the heat flow on land of southern Thailand. CPD is the theoretical depth at which subsurface temperature reaches the value of the Curie point of magnetite, which is 578 °C. CPD can be calculated by deriving the depth of the bottom of the magnetic body to the surface using spectral analysis from airborne magnetic data, and the calculated values can produce the CPD map of southern Thailand. The results show that CPD ranges from 7.88 to 19.75 km with an average of 13.74 km, and heat flow ranges from 61.54 to 154.25 mW/m2 with an average of 90.36 mW/m2. This study suggests that the high heat flow in southern Thailand, which is higher than the regular continental crust heat flow of 65 mW/m2, is possibly caused by a high heat anomaly from mantle upwelling and expressed through weak zones of faults and sutures in extensional tectonic regimes. The high heat from mantle has elevated by five zones: (1) Ranong faults zone, (2) Khlong Marui faults zone, (3) Coastline of Surat Thani and Nakhon Si Thammarat, (4) Trang and Satun zone, and (5) Bentong-Roab suture. These five zones are considered to be high-potential areas for future geothermal resources exploration.