The timing of the orogenic events associated with the closure of South Tethys significantly influenced the generation, migration and entrapment of petroleum in the Zagros Foldbelt of Iran. This influence was particularly important in the Dezful Embayment, which is one of the world's richest oil provinces, containing some 8% of global oil reserves in an area of only 60,000 sq. km. In the Dezful Embayment, oil and associated gas occur in two carbonate reservoirs ‐ the Sarvak Formation of Cenomanian to Turonian age, and the Oligocene ‐ Early Miocene Asmari Formation, sealed by the evaporites of the Gachsaran Formation. The oil and associated gas are trapped in large “whaleback” anticlines which formed during the Neogene Zagros orogeny. Two excellent source rocks, the Albian Kazhdumi Formation and the upper part of the Pabdeh Formation (Middle Eocene to Early Oligocene), supplied the Asmari and Sarvak reservoirs and with them form the Middle Cretaceous to Early Miocene Petroleum System. This system was found to be independent of older petroleum systems. Two particular problems are addressed in this paper. The first is the relative timing of trap formation versus oil expulsion from the source rocks. If oil expulsion occurred prior to Zagros folding, the oil would have migrated along gently dipping ramps towards the Persian (Arabian) Gulf and Southern Iraq, and would have been trapped a long way from the source kitchen. By contrast, if oil expulsion took place when the whaleback anticlines already existed or had at least begun to develop, the oil generated would have moved almost vertically towards the nearest anticline. Secondly, we assess the type of heatflow to be used for modelling. This could be either variable or constant, depending on the stability or instability of the Arabian Platform and on subsidence variations during source rock maturation. Our conclusions can be summarized as follows. First, the paroxysmal phase of Zagros folding commenced in the Dezful Embayment towards the end of the Middle Miocene around 10 Ma ago and continued throughout the Late Miocene and Pliocene. Second, bearing in mind the remarkable stability of the Arabian Platform for some 260 Ma, during which there was almost continuous gentle subsidence between the Permian transgression and the Early Miocene, a constant heatflow was used for modelling. Burial profiles and maturity indices, such as vitrinite reflectance and Rock‐Eval parameters, demonstrate that the Kazhdumi and Pabdeh source rocks reached the onset of oil expulsion during deposition of the Agha Jari Formation between 8 and 3Ma, depending upon the location. This chronology means that oil migrated from source rocks into preexisting Zagros structures. Therefore, oil migrated over short distances to nearby traps within well‐defined drainage areas, the geometry of which can be deduced from seismic data. Moreover, the Zagros folding induced prominent fracturing which can be observed both at outcrop and in wells. This fracturing, which affects lime‐stones as well as marls, enhanced...

In the current Zagros Fold Belt of Iran and in its contiguous offshore, five petroleum systems caused an impressive gathering of oil and gas fields that represent some 8% and 15% of global oil and gas reserves, respectively. Almost all the oil fields are located in the relatively small Dezful Embayment, which extends over 60 000 km 2 , whereas most of the gas fields are concentrated in Central and Coastal Fars and in the contiguous offshore area. This paper describes the functioning of the various petroleum systems through time, each petroleum system having its own specificity, and reconstructs the succession of events that explains the current location of the oil and gas fields and the reservoirs in which oil and/or gas accumulated. In addition to the classical description of the petroleum systems (distribution and organic composition of the source rocks, evolution of their maturity through time, geometry of drains and reservoirs, and trap availability at the time of migration), the influence of tectonic phases (Acadian, Hercynian, Late Cenomanian to pre-Maastrichtian, and Late Miocene to Pliocene Zagros phases) on the various systems are discussed. As the time of oil and/or gas expulsion from the source rocks is necessary to reconstruct migration paths and to locate the traps available at the time of migration, extensive modelling was used.

The examination of production history from hydrocarbon fields composed of turbidite deposits indicates that fluid flow behaviour is often more complex than expected. The cause is commonly linked to the presence of fine-scale sedimentary heterogeneities, which complicate the reservoir. This is especially true in the case of turbiditic submarine channel complexes with final channel-filling stages composed of lateral migration deposits. These fine-scale heterogeneities are usually below seismic resolution and are rarely represented in initial reservoir models designed for such fields. Thus, it is difficult to match the production history or identify methods to improve production and reduce associated risks. The various depositional patterns recognized in channel migration and aggradation packages from the Oligocene Malembo Formation of the Congo Basin, offshore Angola, exhibit different dynamic responses when modelled in a reservoir simulator. These dynamic differences are related to the different preservation rates of bank collapse sediments within isolated channel bodies, hereafter referred to as ‘elementary channels’. According to these preservation differences, the vertical stacking pattern of channels results in better connectivity than the true lateral migration. This effect has been incorporated into a full-field simulation model by applying petrophysical upscaling methods. The recognition and modelling of detailed sedimentological heterogeneities, and their distribution along full-field models produces a better history match when the inherent uncertainties have been taken into account. Incorporating all available data and concepts to define reservoir architecture is essential in understanding the impact that fine-scale heterogeneities have on reservoir management. As the lateral extent and areal distribution of heterogeneities is still unknown, our modelling workflow incorporates uncertainty in the form of multiple realizations to identify and measure all uncertainties that might impact dynamic response.

Reservoir production is highly dependent on reservoir models. A key problem faced in the development of a hydrocarbon reservoir is that of constructing a reservoir model that can generate reliable production forecasts under various development scenarios. Therefore, geological models have to be built in three dimensions (3D). Unfortunately, manual construction of 3D geological models (deterministically) is almost impossible, which explains why geologists often limit their interpretation to two dimensional (2D) correlation panels, fence-diagrams or maps. Consequently, geological conceptual models are rarely included or considerably simplified in reservoir models used for flow simulations and replaced by stochastic or geostatistic approaches. In spite of this admission of failure, sedimentological cross-sections and maps contain most of the knowledge and concepts of sedimentologists. They represent the outcome of sedimentological studies, including available well data, seismic interpretation and especially sedimentological and environmental concepts, incorporating all facies transitions and successions in a high-resolution stratigraphic framework. They allow fine temporal-and spatial-scale sedimentological heterogeneities to be identified. The integration of these fine-scale sedimentological heterogeneities is an essential step in improving the precision and accuracy of static reservoir models and volumetric calculations. This paper demonstrates the quantitative influence of introducing sedimentological information into the reservoir characterization workflow using a simple deterministic workflow. The described incorporation of sedimentological knowledge through facies 3D proportions cubes allows a direct assessment to facies distribution multi-realization scheme and associated uncertainties by applying stochastic simulations.

No abstract