Home – Home – Jornals – Russian Geology and Geophysics 2004 number 1

Numerous large and giant oil and gas discoveries have been reported recently from deepwater basins along oceanic passive margins, high-rank exploration plays of the past decade. These basins originated by a single mechanism as a result of continental rifting, continent breakup and spreading. Their histories differed only in the time of rifting and spreading, the two major events that controlled the stratigraphy and composition of the basin fill. Basin evolution went through successive rifting, early spreading, and developed spreading stages. The first and third stages produced high-quality source and reservoir rocks; salt seals formed at the second stage were deformed by faulting and salt diapirism at the third stage. Source rocks are either oil-producing black shales or organic-rich, often fatty, gas producers. According to the world experience, the greatest potential in Russia can be expected from the Bering and Okhotsk deepwater margins along the Koryak and Sakhalin shelves, and the Nansen basin in the Arctic margin.