Source-Rock Evaluation
DEFINITION OF SOURCE ROCK
Effective source rock: any sedimentary rock that has
already generated and expelled hydrocarbons
Possible source rock: any sedimentary rock whose
source potential has not yet been evaluated, but which may have
generated and expelled hydrocarbons.
Potential source rock: any immature sedimentary rock
known to be capable of generating and expelling hydrocarbons if its
level of thermal maturity were higher.
Factors influencing organic richness
PRODUCTIVITY (many factors influencing
productivity would include nutrient availability,
light intensity, temperature, carbonate supply,
and general water chemistry).
PRESERVATION (Three factors affect the
preservation (or destruction) of organic matter:
the concentration and nature of oxidizing
agents, the type of organic matter deposited,
and the sediment-accumulation rate).
conditions favorable for preservation
Two important factors
(1) sedimentation rate
(2) bottom water oxygen content (oxidation of the organic
matter)
(1) Sedimentation rate:
the amount of organic matter is positively correlated with
sed rate, to a particular rate, and then there is an inverse
correlation at greater sedimentation rates
Sediment Oxygen Regime Comments
Accumulation
Rate Oxic Anoxic
Low Very low BE (<10%), because High BE due to anoxia (50- Note that BE and TOC critically
<1-10 cm/ka-1 of maximum exposure to O2. 80%?) depend on O2 at low LSAR.
e.g. condensed TOC very low (<1%). Minimal dilution. Most ancient shelf source rocks
sections HI low (Type III or IV) High TOC (3-30%) = low LSAR and anoxic.
Organic facies CD or D HI high (Type II).
NO SOURCE ROCKS Organic facies B,
e.g. modern ocean AB, or B
BEST SOURCE ROCKS
e.g. Black Sea (pars)?
Sediment Oxygen Regime Comments
Accumulation
Rate Oxic Anoxic
High Higher BE due to porewater Already optimal BE due to Note that TOC is little further
>20-60 cm/ka-1 anoxia, but high OM dilution. anoxia, thus ‘extra’ LSAR effected by O2 at high LSAR
e.g. late highstand or TOC low to moderate (3%). only gives dilution of OM. as BE is already high.
lowstand systems tracts HI low to moderate as high TOC low to moderate (<6%?). NB. Includes many of the
siliciclastic LSAR linked with Autodilution may be high coastal fjord and OMZ
high phytoclast input. where anoxia caused by high examples used by Calvert and
Organic facies C productivity. Pedersen.
POOR (GAS-PRONE) HI moderate to good.
SOURCE ROCKS Organic facies B
e.g. prodeltaic facies or BC
MODERATE TO GOOD
SOURCE ROCKS
e.g. upwelling -intensified
OMZ facies
PRINCIPLES OF SOURCE-ROCK
EVALUATION
QUANTITY OF ORGANIC MATERIAL
The amount of organic material present in sedimentary rocks is
almost always measured as the total-organic carbon (TOC) content
Some significant TOC values????????????
0.3% limit for carbonate source rocks
0.5% “poor” source potential (shales)
0.5-1.0% “fair” source potential (shales)
1.0-2.0% “good” source potential (shales)
>2.0% “excellent” source potential (shales)
Controls on TOC
TOC is always controlled by a set of three master variables:
TOC = [(I x %P)/( (I x %P x OMF) + D)] 100
(1) the input of OM (I)
(2) the preservation of the supplied OM (P)
(3) the dilution of this OM by mineral matter (D)
OMF is the organic matter factor: the ratio of organic carbon to organic matter.
The relative importance of these variables varies with depositional environment.
Input relates primarily to primary productivity for phytoplankton-derived OM, and
fluvial runoff for terrestrial OM.
Preservation (in this context quantitative rather than qualitative) has a both pre-
depositional and post-depositional component:
Pre- degradation during settling (and resuspension).
Post- diagenetic degradation (which is controlled mainly by sediment
accumulation rate and redox conditions).
Rock-Eval pyrolysis????????
“Rock-Eval” is a brand name for an instrument made by the French
company Vinci Technologies
Small powdered rock samples are progressively heated up to about
550C over a period of 20 minutes (crudely simulating the effects of the
much slower geological rates of heating). As oxygen is excluded, the
organic matter in the rock is pyrolysed, not combusted. The products
are carried to a detector in an inert gas stream and their mass (mg)
determined.
As the temperature is increased, 2 peaks in hydrocarbons (mgHC/g rock = kg/t)
are registered: S1 derived from any hydrocarbon already in the sample (e.g.
contamination, migrant HC, or unexpelled HC generated in situ), S2 from the
thermal cracking of the kerogen. A third S3 peak is also recorded which is the
CO2 released from resistant components of the kerogen. The temperature at
which S2 reaches its maximum is called the Tmax.
Normalisation of the Rock-Eval pyrolysis yields to the sample TOC allows the
calculation of two key quality parameters:
Hydrogen index (HI): correlated with atomic H/C and a measure of
hydrocarbon generating capacity remaining in the sample (and, indirectly,
of liptinite preservation)
Total range: 20-1200 mgHC/gTOC; >200 = oil-prone; well preserved
immature Type II = 600.
Oxygen index (OI): correlated with atomic O/C. May be unreliable due to CO2 from
carbonate (especially the mineral siderite). Ranges from <10 to several hundred
(latter generally only in organic-poor, oxidised sediments, such as many deep-sea
samples). Well preserved immature Type II kerogen = 20-60.
A cross-plot of HI and OI is called a “modified van Krevelen diagram”. A HI vs. Tmax
diagram can also be used.
Reference values for HI
All values below are those commonly regarded as typical for very well
preserved OM of each kind; all values can be lowered by oxic degradation
during or soon after deposition
Type I = 900 (850-950)
Type II (well preserved AOM) = 600 (550-775)
Type III = 100-190 (higher in coals, lower in dispersed OM in shales)
Type IV = 20-50
1300 Any values less than 20 or more than are erroneous.
Problems with interpretation
Data are often unreliable at low TOC, especially if <0.5%, but sometimes
even if up to 2% or more. This is due to the “matrix effect’’
Pyrolysis data provide a bulk characterisation of the organic matter
in a sample, but do not explain why the sample has these
properties. Accurate interpretation requires integration with
microscopy and geological data. The position where a sample plots
on the modified Van Krevelen diagram is a function of:
organic matter source(s)
organic matter preservation state(s)*
sample maturity
*includes effect of weathering after uplift effect ”
Kerogen?????
Kerogen is normally defined as that portion of the organic matter present in
sedimentary rocks that is insoluble in ordinary organic solvents. The soluble portion,
called bitumen
The chemical and physical characteristics of a kerogen are strongly influenced by
the type of biogenic molecules from which the kerogen is formed and by diagenetic
transformafions of those organic molecules.
Kerogen composition is also affected by thermal maturation processes
(catagenesis and metagenesis) that alter the original kerogen. Subsurface
heating causes chemical reactions that break off small fragments of the
kerogen as oil or gas molecules
Large organic biopolymers of highly regular structure (proteins and carbohydrates, for
example) are partially or completely dismantled, and the individual component parts
are either destroyed or used to construct new geopolymers, large molecules that have
no regular or biologically defined structure. These geopolymers are the precursors for
kerogen but are not yet true kerogens. The smallest of these geopolymers are usually
called fulvic acids;
slightly larger ones, humic acids; and still larger ones, humins
True kerogens, having very high molecular weights, develop after tens or hundreds of
meters of burial
KEROGEN COMPOSITION
Kerogen typing
Objectives
Key categories for source rock work
simple classification
Detailed counts
Geochemical kerogen types
elemental analysis
Van Krevelen diagrams
concepts
Kerogen typing objectives:
1) Source potential (descriptive), OR
2) Source potential in relation to palaeoenvironment (genetic)
Key categories in source rock work
In order to determine the hydrocarbon generating potential of the kerogen we
only need to determine the relative abundance of the following categories:
inert (“dead carbon”)
gas-prone (“humic”)
oil-prone (“sapropelic”)
very oil-prone (“sapropelic”)
coaly (inert)
woody (gas)
herbaceous (oil, if well preserved)
amorphous (oil, if well preserved)
algal (oil, if well preserved)
Detailed classifications
More categories are needed (>10)
Brown phytoclast subcategories based on tissue type (type of
biostructure)
Palynomorph type: morphological, ecological and taxonomic
groupings
Preservational categories:
fluorescence (geochemical preservation)
outline: angular v. corroded (physical preservation)
Phytoclast shape categories: black equant v. lath
Geochemical kerogen types
These are based on the work of van Krevelen on coals. He analysed pure (picked –
physically separated) samples of different maceral groups and macerals by elemental
analysis, and found that they occupied different positions on a plot of the H/C and O/C
atomic ratios (now referred to as a van Krevelen diagram). These positions also change
with rank (maturity) due the loss of water, CO2 and hydrocarbons. In order of
decreasing H/C ratio these end-members are:
Geochemical kerogen types?????
alginite liptinite
(equivalent to Type I)
sporinite liptinite
(equivalent to Type II)
vitrinite/huminite
(equivalent to Type III)
inertinite
(equivalent to Type IV) Van Krevelen diagram showing maturation pathways for Types 1 to IV
kerogens as traced by changes in atomic HIC and OIC ratios. The
shaded areas approximately represent diagenesis, catagenesis, and
metagenesis, successively.
There are two different concepts of kerogen type:
1st: Type is defined by measured parameters (HI & OI, H/C & O/C): more
objective and strongly affected by maturity
2nd: Type is defined primarily by the OM source (genetic kerogen type), whose
composition varies predictably with preservation, mixing, and
maturity.
It is impossible to be sure of the genetic type from geochemical data without optical
kerogen analysis.
Organic Chemistry
Anyone who uses petroleum geochemistry must be familiar with basic chemical
Terminology
NAMES AND STRUCTURES:
HYDROCARBONS (In chemical terms a hydrocarbon is a compound
containing only the elements carbon and hydrogen)
saturated hydrocarbons or saturates
Names and formulas of the ten smallest n-alkanes
Methane CH4 CH4
Ethane C2H6 CH3CH3
Propane C3H8 CH3CH2CH3
Butane C4H10 CH3 (CH2)2 CH3
Pentane C5H12 CH3 (CH2)3 CH3
Hexane C6H14 CH3 (CH2)4 CH3
Heptane C7H16 CH3 (CH2)5 CH3
Octane C8H18 CH3 (CH2)6 CH3
Nonane C9H20 CH3 (CH2)7 CH3
Decane C10H22 CH3 (CH2)8 CH3
Another important group of hydrocarbons is the unsaturates
able to combine with additional hydrogen. Many unsaturated compounds have carbon-
carbon double bonds; these compounds are called alkenes
They are named in a similar
. manner to the alkanes, except that the ending -ene
indicates the presence of a double bond.
Aromatic Hydrocarbons
Benzene
.
Naphthalene
Phenanthrene
Aromatic steroidal
R
hydrocarbon
NONHYDROCARBONS
Atoms other than hydrogen and carbon that occur in petroleum, bitumen, and kerogen
are called heteroatoms.Heterocompounds are also called NSO compounds, because
the most common heteroatoms are nitrogen, sulfur, and oxygen
