Talara Basin Petroleum Systems The basins located off the coast of Northern Peru , along the convergent margin of the Nazca Plate with the South American Plate, are Paleogene and Neogene depositional troughs that have considerable proven and potential hydrocarbon accumulations in a variety of structural and stratigraphic plays. In Peru, these basins are named from north to south, Jambeli, Talara and Sechura. The Tumbes Basin of northern Peru extends into Ecuador at the Gulf of Guayaquil region where it is known as the Jambeli Trough. It is a Neogene pull-apart depression controlled by a SW-trending regional strike-slip fault system that extends north as the Dolores-Guayaquil Fault Zone. Southward, this thick Oligocene to Pliocene section rests with angular unconformity on the shallow marine Paleogene sediments of the Talara Basin. The Talara Basin, one of the most productive forearc basins so far discovered, is the northern-most of several basins occurring along the Peruvian coastal shelf. It occupies an area of approximately 17,000 sq. km (~6500 square miles). The producing pools in this basin form a complex that could be considered as one giant field. Oil production is dominant but excellent potential is indicated for offshore gas discoveries. Eighty percent of the total oil production (more than 1.5 billion barrels) is from onshore fields that occupy a small part of the area of the basin. There have been more than 9,000 producing wells drilled to depths that vary between 600m and 2700m. The Talara Province has more than fifty (50) active oil or gas fields, producing from over a dozen different Eocene reservoirs. In this region there is a large potential for undiscovered pools, particularly in the offshore area. In fact, most of the recent producing pools are found in the nearshore belt, west of the old onshore producing fields. |
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Oil production from the onshore Tumbes Basin dates back to the 19th century when the first fields were discovered in 1865. The number of wells drilled to date exceeds 470. Sedimentary pile has an average thickness of 5,000 m of Late Oligocene, Miocene, and Pliocene sequences, and the producing reservoirs are the Zorritos sands. Since 1973, five offshore exploration wells were drilled in this complex basinal system, all of them producing oil and gas. The most significant discovery is the Albacora pool. A few kilometers north of the Ecuador-Peru border is the large Amistad Gas Field. The onshore Progreso Basin is a Late Tertiary sag filled mainly by Mio-Pliocene marine shales and sandstones up to 3,950 m (13,000 ft) thick, covering an area of 2,500 sq km (600,000 acres). About 17 wildcats were drilled here during various exploration campaigns, but although some non-commercial oil and gas shows were encountered, all wells were abandoned as dry holes. There is no charge for this report. |
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Contact Rick Schrynemeeckers, Managing Director: Call: 1-281-681-8811 |
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