ASSESSMENT FOR PETROLEUM RESOURCE IN EAST GREENLAND BASIN

The onshore and offshore areas of the East Greenland Basin are the key areas for petroleum exploration in both the North Pole and deep waters at present. The assessment made by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) suggested a substantial petroleum potential in this area, with high risk and uncertainty in exploration at the same time. This paper compares the reservoir forming conditions based on the data from the East Greenland Basin and the North Sea Basin. The petroleum potential of East Greenland Basin is assessed applying geochemistry methods and analogy. The East Greenland Basin was a rift basin in Late Paleozoic—Mesozoic, consisting of two depressions with a uplift in between, and it is similar with the Norwegian continental basin before the later entering the stage of passive continental margin. There are similarities in depositional environment, thermal subsidence of rifting and post-rifting deformation in Paleozoic and Mesozoic. In the East Greenland Basin, there were lacustrine source rocks in Late Paleozoic and marine source rocks in Upper Jurassic.There are shallow-marine sandstone reservoirs occurred in the Middle Jurassic and deep-marine turbidity sandstone reservoirs in the Cretaceous.There are various types of trap dominated mainly by extensional structure traps, horst and fault-block traps, salt structure traps, and stratigraphic traps. There are superior reservoir forming conditions, favorable petroleum potential and preferable exploration prospect in the East Greenland Basin. Among all the geological factors, which may affect the accumulation of petroleum resources, the favorable types of trap, essential amount of source rock, conditions of petroleum generation and appropriate burial histories have to be further confirmed.