The Bolivian Source Rocks. Sub Andean Zone. Madre de Dios. Chaco

Abstract

A complete study of source-rock geochemical data has been carried out for the Bolivian foothills and foreland (Sub Andean Zone, Chaco and Madre de Dios) in order to quantify the petroleum potential of the area. Overall available data have been compiled in a database, and a synthesis of the results is presented here. Besides the classical mid-Devonian source rocks (Tequeje Fm in the north, Limoncito Fm in the center and Los Monos Fm in the south), others may be just as important : theTomachi Fm (late Devonian) in the north of the country and the Copacabana Fm. (late Carboniferous-early Permian) in the northern Sub Andean Zone. Both present an excellent potential with S2 up to 40 mg HC/g and average values larger than 10 mg HC/g on few hundred meters. The latest Cretaceous (Flora Fm in the northern Sub Andean Zone) also presents locally a high potential but has almost no influence, its thickness being quite reduced. Almost all the source rocks matured during the Neogene due to the subsidence in the Andean foreland and, locally, in the piggyback basins, and are thus involved in the current petroleum system. Silurian and Lower Paleozoic units also contain thick shale beds, but these source rocks were mature before the Jurassic in most of the country, except in the Chaco, the Boomerang and the central Sub Andean Zone, where the Silurian is not nowadays overmature and may play an important role. The different zones are compared based on their Source Potential Index (SPI) which indicates that the richest areas are the northern Sub Andean Zone and the Madre de Dios basin with SPI greater than 10 t/m². Since these two areas remain almost unexplored and, at least for the northern Sub Andean zone, present very large structures, these results allow to be optimistic about the possibilities for future exploration.