Ranking ‘White space’ Frontier Regions – An Arctic Example Illustrating the Power of Integrating Plate Tectonic Reconstructions into Regional Evaluations

摘要

The incorporation of robust plate tectonic reconstructions into regional evaluations has the power to identify potential ‘whitespace’rnbasins where significant prospectivity is possible but where there is relatively limited current knowledge and orrnavailable data. This enables decision-makers to make judicious decisions when entering new frontier regions with minimalrnexposure and can also influence data acquisition strategy. This paper documents a basin ranking workflow applied to the vastrnCircum-Arctic region. Integration of regional geological mapping along with seismic and potential fields data in a digitalrnformat provides a consistent framework upon which to reconstruct the geological history of the region through time and tornextrapolate key petroleum system elements from known calibrated areas into relatively poorly known regions. Using a set ofrncriteria based on the elements required for a working petroleum system, a schematic basin ranking of ~140 Arctic basins wasrncompleted highlighting opportunities in ‘white-space’ basins and also areas that may be high-graded pending furtherrnevaluation.