Abstract
Geoscience Australia recently completed a petroleum prospectivity assessment of the Capel and Faust basins as part of the Australian government's energy security program. This pre-competitive study was carried out in collaboration with GNS Science and the government of New Caledonian, and was based on seismic, potential field, multibeam bathymetry and sample data acquired during marine surveys in 2006–7. The Capel and Faust basins are located in the Tasman Sea region, which contains a number of deepwater basins. There is little information about their geology. The Geoscience Australia study confirmed the existence of large compartmentalised depocentres containing sediments up to 6 km thick. The basins formed during two Cretaceous extensional episodes related to the final breakup of eastern Gondwana. Syn-rift deposition appears to have been initially dominated by volcanics and volcaniclastics, then dominated by non-marine to shallow marine clastics. The post-rift succession comprises upward-fining clastic to calcareous bathyal sediments. A pre-rift (?Mesozoic) sedimentary succession appears to underlie some depocentres. Mesozoic successions in nearby eastern Australian and New Zealand basins suggest that fluvio-deltaic potential source rocks (Triassic/Jurassic to Upper Cretaceous coals) may occur in the pre-rift and syn-rift successions of the Capel and Faust basins. Multi-1D basin modelling suggests that the deeper depocentres are presently within the oil or gas generation window and that expulsion occurred from the Early Cretaceous. Fluvio-deltaic, shoreline and turbiditic sandstones may provide potential reservoirs. Likely play types include large anticlines, fault blocks, unconformities, and stratigraphic pinchouts. The results will guide future exploration and reduce risk in this vast frontier region.
Published Version
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