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Thermal effects of subduction in the source rock maturity of Tumbes and

Talara forearc basins

Presentation · October 2018

DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.31033.42082

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4 authors:

Adriana Lemgruber Traby Nicolas Espurt

IFP Energies nouvelles Aix-Marseille Université
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Christine Souque Ysabel Calderon

IFP Energies nouvelles Perupetro S.A.
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 Thermal effects of subduction in the source rock
maturity of Tumbes and Talara forearc basins

Adriana Lemgruber Traby∗†1 , Nicolas Espurt2 , Christine Souque1 , and Ysabel Calderon3
1
IFP Energies nouvelles (IFPEN) – IFP Energies Nouvelles, IFP Energies Nouvelles – France
2
Centre européen de recherche et dénseignement de géosciences de lénvironnement (CEREGE) – Centre
National de la Recherche Scientifique : UMR7330 – France
3
Perupetro (Perupetro) – Pérou

Résumé

Forearc systems are complex zones belonging on subduction zones. Forearc regions have
been generally discarded by petroleum industry mostly because of their high structural and
stratigraphic complexities, polyphase tectonic histories, active tectonics and their inferred
low petroleum potential. The Talara basin of the North Peruvian forearc system is one of the
striking exceptions to this generally held idea. This basin is considered as a giant oil province
that is explored since 1869 and produced more than 1.7Bbbl of oil. However, the petroleum
system remains poorly understood and the outer offshore part of Talara basin and the ad-
jacent Tumbes basin are relatively unexplored and is now the subject of a new exploration
campaign. This frontier zone represents a challenge for future georessource explorations and
strategies in forearc areas. One important issue to evaluate the hydrocarbon potential of
this area concerns the source-rock kitchens. Are they the same as those responsible for the
known fields? Is the thermal maturity of the Talara and Tumbes depocenters sufficient to
generate hydrocarbons from the potentially organic rich intervals?
We present a basement and sedimentary basin modeling calibrated in temperature along two
NW-trending sequentially restored balanced cross sections. The cooling engendered by the
subduction of the oceanic crust is considered in a basin and petroleum system model. The
thermal history was calculated from the base of the thermal lithosphere to the sea/ground
floor all along the basin evolution using heat advection and conduction, as well as radiogenic
production in the continental crust.
This modeling shows the prime control of the cold nose engendered by the oceanic subduc-
tion and its impact on the thermal maturity of the Tumbes and Talara potential source
rocks. As expected, the thermal cooling is more important close to the trench, whereas the
more proximal areas are isolated by the down-lying continental crust. The present day basal
heat flow varies from 30 mW/m2 near the trench to 65 mW/m2 onshore. At the onshore
Lancones basin, the Cretaceous source rocks are completely overmature since the Eocene,
when its burial reached 5 km-thick (before the Oligocene and Miocene erosion events). How-
ever, in the distal part of the Tumbes depocenter, the potential Tertiary source rocks (Heath
Formation) reach the oil generation window only locally and very recently with at least 7
km-thick of burial.

Mots-Clés: forearc, thermal maturity, subduction, basin modeling

∗
Intervenant
†
Auteur correspondant: adriana.traby@ifpen.fr

sciencesconf.org:rst2018-lille:219864

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