KEY PROBLEMS IN OIL AND GAS EXPLORATION FOR THE MESO-PALEOZOIC IN THE SOUTH YELLOW SEA

During the past 52 years, no commercial oil and gas have been discovered in the Southern Yellow Sea Basin. As far as the Meso-Paleozoic is concerned, the key problems remain with the evaluation and selection of the exploration targets, the delineation of the distribution of the Paleozoic, the clarification of the distribution and formation of Meso-Paleozoic basins, and the understanding of characteristics of well-to-seismic geology. As to the Mesozoic, it needs to understand more about the foreland period of the Triassic marine reservoir system and the Jurassic hydrocarbon-rich depression. It is widely believed that there are several sets of high quality source rocks in the upper and lower Paleozoic of the Lower Yangtze Region. On the central uplift of the South Yellow Sea Basin, the Paleozoic is believed a significant prospect, where multiphase of complex tectonic movement prevailed. It is worthy to make further study on the sources of oil and gas. It is probably that oil and gas are coming from the deeper part, which is quite different with the cases in the Sichuan basin. Therefore, it is critical to carry out comprehensive exploration from the viewpoint of multiple zones and multiple angles.