Overview on the subsurface structure-tectonic controls in the northwest Bahariya,Western Desert,Egypt

A regional structural investigation was done on the northwestern part of Bahariya Oasis, using the potential field maps aided by geo-seismic sections and wells data. The gravity and magnetic maps were reinterpreted in context of geotectonic evolution of the north Western Desert to throw more light on the source of subsurface structures. Several processing methods and filtering techniques were applied to delineate locations, trends and depths of main source structures. Qualitatively, the study indicates that Bahariya horst is the highest in gravity, Sitra platform has the strongest magnetism, whereas Misawage graben is the largest in depth to the basement surface. The results were integrated to construct a tentative tectonic map, which exhibits an older folding in the NW direction intersected by a younger ENE trend, which seems to be crossed by a set of NW-trending faults. The map underlines regional folding in NE-SW trend (Syrian arc), forming four major structural features (Misawage graben, Sitra platform, Bahariya uplift and Dirrut basin), each has distinctive characteristics. The tectonic model suggests two different forces (NNW-compression and ENE-tension) affected the area, forming two main fold trends and five cycles of deformation. The models indicate a rough basement surface with a regional dip regime toward the north, overlain by a sedimentary cover ranges between 1 and 4.5 km in thickness. The basement is generally of acidic composition with some basic intrusions penetrate the boundary faults.     

Source rock evaluation of Kharita and Bahariya formations in some wells,North Western Desert,Egypt: Visual palynofacies and organic geochemical approaches

Palynofacies analyses were applied on ninety-one samples from the subsurface Albian – Cenomanian succession represented by Kharita and Bahariya formations, encountered in El-Noor, and South Sallum wells, located in the North Western Desert, Egypt, to visually characterize the content of dispersed organic matter, as well as, organic geochemical characterization to reveal the depositional paleoenvironments and source rock potentiality. The result recognized of five palynofacies associations in the studied interval. The deposition of Kharita Formation took place mainly in a steady and a relatively stable deltaic to marginal environment continued as well in the lower part of Bahariya Formation with minor changes. The marine influence became more common in the upper part of Bahariya Formation showing the exceptional high hydrocarbon potential recorded in the studied interval. This indicates marine transgression by the end of the early Cenomanian (Upper Bahariya) age. Samples from the Kharita Formation contain abundant brown phytoclasts which suggest gas-prone kerogen type III and IV. While Bahariya Formation includes translucent, brown cuticles and woody tracheid phytoclasts pointing to more promising gas-prone kerogen type III. The organic geochemical analysis shows poor to fair gas-prone source rock potential within the study section., Thermally, the color of the spore grains in Kharita and Bahariya formations show that dark yellow to orange, indicates immature besides their general little poor hydrocarbon generation potentiality.     

Determination of Some Reservoir Characteristics of the Bahariya Formation in Bed-1 Field,Western Desert,Egypt, by Using the Repeat Formation Tester

Repeat formation tester (RFT) data are used for interpreting some reservoir characteristics such as the nature of fluids and permeability for the Bahariya formation by using five wells in the Bed-1 Field in the Western Desert of Egypt. The Schlumberger RFT is an open hole wireline device showing a continuous recording of the pressure leads to construct the pressure gradient. These gradients give information about the fluid density and then the nature of fluids (gas, oil, and water). Also the depths of contacts between water and hydrocarbon products can be located by the abrupt change in the pressure gradients. The permeabilities of Bahariya formation are evaluated qualitatively by the direct interpretation of the pressure curve recorded at each test and quantitatively by the analysis of drawdown pressure data. Moreover, the porosities of reservoir rocks were determined by using the available logs of density and neutron. These porosities were corrected for the effect of shale. Also, the saturation of hydrocarbon is determined and then these values of porosities and saturation of hydrocarbon are presented zonewise to show their vertical variation within the wells.     

Bulk Geochemical Characteristics of Crude Oils From Wells in the North Western Desert,Egypt

Abstract

Different oil samples were collected from oil fields in the North Western Desert; namely, Meleiha, Razaak, and North Qarun fields. These oils were analyzed geochemically, including sulfur content, American Petroleum Institute (API) gravity, and gas chromatography The results showed that API gravity and sulfur content indicate that the crude oils have high mature level of marine origin. Distribution of n-alkanes (Carbon Preference Index [CPI], pr/ph, and isoprenoide/n-alkanes ratios) reflects that the oil samples originated mainly from marine organic sources deposited in a reducing environment. This indicates that the oil samples under investigation are well correlated with each other in the western part of the North Western Desert.     

Isopach,lithofacies changes,and source rocks chracteristics of Khatatba and Alam El Bueib formations of some wells in North East Western Desert,Egypt

The present work deals with isopach, lithofacies changes, and source rock chracteristics of Khatatba and Alam El Bueib formations of some wells in North East Western Desert. Isopach and lithofacies changes showed that the thickness of Khatatba Formation increases toward the south western direction and decreases toward northern parts, and the sediments consisting of sandstone and shale facies indicate a shallow marine environment. Alam El-Bueib sediments increase toward the north direction, and argillaceous sandstone facies reflect terrestrial-to-shallow marine environment. The geochemical analysis showed that Khatatba Formation bears a mature source rock and has poor-to-good generating capability for both oil and gas and lie within the early generation window and oil window. Alam El Buieb Formation constitutes a mature source rock and has poor-to-good generating capability for both oil and gas. It can be stated that Khatatba and Alam El Buieb are the main source rock for hydrocarbon accumulations rich with organic sediments and could be considered as effective source rocks for generating hydrocarbons in the the studied wells.     

Petrophysical evaluation of clastic Upper Safa Member using well logging and core data in the Obaiyed field in the Western Desert of Egypt

Upper Safa Member is part of Jurassic Khatatba Formation; it consists of low net gross ratio sand streaks. The core and well logging data were used to perform a comprehensive reservoir evaluation. The Schlumberger application “Techlog” was used to perform the required evaluation analysis. Four oriented wells were selected for this study. The volume of shale “Vsh” using gamma-ray (GR) was used to evaluate the lithology and to discriminate sand “reservoir” from shale “non-reservoir”. A porosity model using the density log was constructed and used as an input to calculate Archie’s water saturation “Sw”. Porosity- Permeability (Poro-Perm) Transform was used to evaluate the reservoir permeability. The net reservoir and net pay thicknesses were seen attractive in three out of four wells. The reservoir quality parameters “Porosity and Permeability” were different from well to well. The hydrocarbon saturation “Sh” was high in the three wells. The hydrocarbon intervals depths were highlighted and considered in the perforation strategy.     

埃及西沙漠盆地中生界烃源岩特征及剩余资源分布

西沙漠盆地是埃及三大主要含油气区之一,已发现大量的油气田,现处勘探发现中期,预探风险增大。为此,在详细评价盆地烃源岩地球化学特征基础上,运用盆地数值模拟技术定量分析剩余资源潜力。研究认为,中侏罗统Khatatba组Safa段和Zahra段煤系暗色泥页岩以及上白垩统Abu Roash组AR-F段暗色泥页岩是盆地的3套主力烃源岩,各凹陷烃源岩广泛分布,厚度变化较大。Khatatba组烃源岩TOC含量在0.5%~10%,裂解烃S₂含量高,为中等-很好烃源岩;Abu Roash组AR-F段烃源岩TOC主要在0.5%~3%,裂解烃S₂含量中-高,属中等-好烃源岩。这3套烃源岩有机质干酪根类型以混合Ⅱ型为主,其次是Ⅲ型,少量为Ⅰ型。指出Khatatba组2套烃源岩全盆处于热演化成熟大量生排烃阶段,凹陷中心达高熟生烃、局部过熟生气阶段,油气并生;Abu Roash组AR-F段烃源岩仅Abu Gharadig和Natrun凹陷进入成熟生烃阶段。提出盆地北部地区主要由侏罗系Khatatba组烃源岩供给油气,东南部地区则有侏罗系Khatatba组和白垩系AR-F段双源供烃。计算表明,盆地剩余可采资源量达6.51×10⁸ t,剩余资源潜力很好;其中,南部Abu Gharadig凹陷古生界、侏罗系和下白垩统AEB,北部Matruh凹陷古生界、Faghur凹陷上白垩统,油气探明程度低,剩余资源可观,为下步勘探的有利方向。     

Evaluation of the nature,origin and potentiality of the subsurface Middle Jurassic and Lower Cretaceous source rocks in Melleiha G-1x well,North Western Desert,Egypt

The present work aims to evaluate the nature and origin of the source rock potentiality of subsurface Middle Jurassic and Lower Cretaceous source rocks in Melleiha G-1x well. This target was achieved throughout the evaluation of total organic carbon, rock Eval pyrolysis and vitrinite reflectance for fifteen cutting samples and three extract samples collected from Khatatba, Alam El Bueib and Kharita formations in the studied well. The result revealed that the main hydrocarbon of source rocks, for the Middle Jurassic (Khatatba Fm.) is mainly mature, and has good capability of producing oil and minor gas. Lower Cretaceous source rocks (Alam El Bueib Fm.) are mature, derived from mixed organic sources and have fair to good capability to generate gas and oil. Kharita Formation of immature source rocks originated from terrestrial origin and has poor to fair potential to produce gas. This indicates that Khatatba and Alam El Bueib formations take the direction of increasing maturity far away from the direction of biodegradation and can be considered as effective source potential in the Melleiha G-1x well.     

API gravities,vanadium, nickel,sulfur, and their relation to gross composition: Implications for the origin and maturation of crude oils in Western Desert,Egypt

In the present study, the geochemical analyses of API gravities, vanadium, nickel, sulfur, and bulk composition were performed on eight samples from productive wells in Gindi, South Deep Abu-gharadig, Abu-gharadig, Dahab-Merier, and Faghure basins locates in the North Western Desert. The results were used to describe the source organic matter input, depositional environment, assess the degree of thermal maturity, and to correlate between crude oils to determine the genetic relationship between hydrocarbon generation and their source rock for the studied oil samples. The results showed that a wide range of crude oil parameters exists in this data, indicating that a variety of oil types is represented. Crude oils range from unaltered to altered by vanadium, nickel, and sulfur concentrations, V/Ni and saturate fraction were used to classify the oils. Oils are classified into two groups. Group I contains oil samples from Gindi, South deep Abu-gharadig and Abu-gharadig, and Dahab-Merier that are generated from organic matter input deposited in marine environment under anoxic to suboxic conditions. Group II from Faghur basin possess high Pr/Ph ratios suggesting high contribution of terreginous organic matter deposited under relatively oxic conditions.     

Multivariate statistical analysis for monitoring the hydrocarbon potentiality of the source rocks in the North Western Desert,Egypt

The authors aimed to examine a multivariate statistical analysis approach for monitoring the hydrocarbon potentiality of source rocks in the North Western Desert to recognize the potentiality of source rocks and subsequently investigate the maturation level of the proven potential source formations for oil preservation. To achieve this aim, they applied multivariate statistics analysis (principle component analysis [PCA], cluster analysis, and correlation coefficient) and Rock-Eval pyrolysis analyses. The results showed that both PCA and cluster analyses have showed two types of source rocks. The first is classified as poor to fair source rock and immature to marginally mature source rock, the second is considered as fair to good source rock and mature to post mature source rock. PCA extracted two independent factors, which explained 81.87% of the total variance. The first type of source rock was responsible for 50% of the total variance and was best represented by variables TOC, S2, OI, and R_o, and the second one was responsible for 31.65% of the total variance and was represented by the HI variable. Pearson correlation coefficient showed a significant positive correlation between TOC and S2 or R_o. A positive correlation between S2 and HI or OI and also between OI and R_o was observed, while no significant correlation was noticed between HI and R_o.