Petroleum Basins of the Soviet Arctic

Abstract

SummaryThe Soviet Arctic extends 6700 km from the border with Norway, on the west, to the border with the United States, on the east. The region contains the largest unexplored shelf area on earth – approximately 3917000 km2. Of the several onshore petroleum-bearing basins, at least two extend into the offshore – the Timano-Pechora basin, which passes beneath the Barents Sea, and the West Siberian basin, which includes much of the Kara Sea. The Laptev and East Siberian Seas seem to be underlain by separate offshore basins, possibly unrelated to any onshore. The Chukchi Sea is geologically a part of the Alaskan North Slope. The Vilyuy basin, along the Vilyuy and Lena Rivers, does not extend offshore. Only small basins are present along the Pacific shore; of these, two have petroleum potential – the Khatyrka basin which passes eastwards into the Navarin basin of the Bering Sea, and the Anadyr' basin which joins the St Lawrence basin. Peripheral to the Arctic, but of great importance relative to several Canadian Arctic basins, is the Irkutsk amphitheatre in which the main hydrocarbon accumulations are Proterozoic.Of the three largest onshore basins, the West Siberian is the greatest, with major production from Lower and Middle Cretaceous, and smaller production from Upper Jurassic and Upper Palaeozoic rocks. The major production from the Timano-Pechora basin is from the Middle Devonian and Upper Carboniferous–Lower Permian; minor production is from the Silurian, Lower Devonian, Upper Devonian, Lower Carboniferous, Upper Permian and Triassic. Production in the Vilyuy basin – all of it gas – is from Lower and Middle Jurassic, Triassic and Permian. Although non-commercial, known potential production from the Nordvik area is from Triassic and Permian sandstones; that from the Khatyrka basin is Oligocene and that from the Anadyr' basin is Miocene. The potential of the Soviet Arctic is huge, with major oil reserves and the largest known gas reserves on the earth.

Geology and assessment of undiscovered oil and gas resources of the Timan-Pechora Basin Province, Russia, 2008

“…2) has been a subject of research since the 1970s. Two of the first compilations of the petroleum geology of the province (in English) were by Meyerhoff (1980) and Ulmishek (1982), who summarized much of the extensive Russian research. As defined, the Timan-Pechora Basin Province is a complex amalgamation of rift basins, inverted rifts, and horsts; …”

Chapter 18 Geology and petroleum potential of the Timan–Pechora Basin Province, Russia

“…Two of the first compilations of the petroleum geology (in English) were by Meyerhoff (1980) and Ulmishek (1982), who summarized much of the extensive Russian research. The Timan -Pechora Basin Province is a complex amalgamation of rift basins, inverted rifts and horsts, and a series of foreland basins along the Uralian orogenic front on the east margin of the province (Fig.…”

Geomechanical Performance of Hydrate-Bearing Sediment in Offshore Environments

“…The rock and fluid properties we used for the Messoyakha Field simulations are shown in Table 3-2 (Makogon et al, 1971a;Meyerhoff, 1980;Krason and Ciesnik, 1985;Krason and Finley, 1992;Makogon et al, 2005). The gas composition at Messoyakha is 98.8% methane.…”