Document Type : Original Article
Authors
1
BP Egypt, 14 Road 252, Digla, Maadi, PO Box 2409, Cairo 11431, Egypt.
2
Department of Geology, Faculty of Science, Ain Shams University, Cairo 11566, Egypt.
3
40 El Akshed St, Cairo 11451, Egypt.
Abstract
The Egyptian Red Sea basin has been the focus for several oil and gas exploration efforts, that started in the last century’s mid-seventies, until the early millennium. However, due to the limited number of wells, relative to its vast untested area, it can be considered an underexplored basin. Evidence of working hydrocarbon systems in the basin have been observed and documented onshore and offshore by some of the wells drilled along the Egyptian and Saudi margins. Information from the drilled wells support the presence of good quality source and reservoir rocks, in addition to having several oil and gas shows, that support charging from thermally mature source rock(s). Furthermore, oil seeps have been documented in other parts of the basin in Ethiopia- Eretria and the offshore Yemen in the southern Red Sea basin, where the rift extension is greater. The syn- and pre-rift petroleum systems have been proven north of the Red Sea, in the Gulf of Suez basin, which represents the northern arm of the Red Sea-Gulf of Aden rift system. The Gulf of Suez basin has been explored and produced hydrocarbon since 1886 and can be used as, an analogue for the petroleum systems elements, such as source and reservoir rocks, and trapping mechanism. In this paper, integrating well information and the available mid-seventies 2D seismic lines, we were able to highlight the hydrocarbon possibilities of the western margin of the Egyptian Red Sea basin. Two potential play fairways and trapping styles have been described along the northern Egyptian Red Sea margin. They are mainly syn-rift Miocene Clastics and probable pre-rift fairways, similar to the Gulf of Suez petroleum system elements. However, due to the uncertainties in the stratigraphic correlation between the different rock units between the Northern Red Sea and Southern Gulf of Suez and the limited offshore well penetrations in the Northern Red Sea these fairways have source and reservoir rocks distribution and quality uncertainties. The presence of thick and mobile evaporites sequence in the syn-rift section, provides the ultimate top seal for the identified fairways.
Keywords
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