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PETROLEUM SYSTEM AND PLAY CONCEPTS: DEEP WATER BALKANIDES - WESTERN BLACK SEA BASIN

B. Wright, E. Higgins

Abstract

An ongoing geologic and geophysical investigation in the deep-water Black Sea, offshore Bulgaria reveals conditions suitable for hydrocarbon accumulations with giant field size potential. This potential lies within the buried offshore extension of the Paleogene Balkanide fold belt and its adjacent Eocene-Oligocene foreland basin, in water depths of 500-1,700 meters. With the benefit of onshore geologic studies and new offshore seismic acquisition and processing, it is possible to recognize and evaluate the basic elements of this potential petroleum system. The area comprising the Bourgas Deep Sea exploration license is characterized by the presence of a tremendously thickened and preserved Paleogene sedimentary wedge that was folded into a series of arcuate anticlinal trends across a low friction Upper Cretaceous decollement. These sediments were derived from the onshore, siliciclastic Balkanide orogenic wedge (Dvoynitsa Formation), and transported to the deep basin via the Lower Kamchia Depression in the form of basin floor fan and channel systems. They are expected to contain facies suitable for both hydrocarbon reservoirs and source rocks. The Eocene and Lower Oligocene strata of the immediately adjacent deep water foreland are buried by younger sediments to a depth appropriate for oil generation and migration from mid-Oligocene time to the present day.

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