Growth faults and salt tectonics in Houston diapir province: relative timing and exploration significance
Oil and gas accumulation in Gulf Coast Tertiary strata is contolled mainly by regional growth faults and by salt-related structures. Salt forms the most prominent set of structures in the Houston diapir province of southeast Texas. Recent work in three study areas shows that the Tertiary growth-fault trends, so well displayed along strike to the south-west, continue through this salt basin as well, but they have been deformed by later salt movement. In the Katy area, seismic data disclose early (pre-Wilcox) salt pillows downdip of the Cretaceous reef trend. Salt stocks were injected upward from the pillows during Clayborne deposition, and were flanked by deep withdrawal basins and turtle structures. In Brazoria County, a major lower Frio growth-fault trend affecting the Houston delta system, was deformed by later salt domes, by a salt-withdrawal basin, and by a possible turtle structure at Chocolate Bayou. A productive geopressured aquifer exists in the salt-withdrawal basin bounded by the previously formed growth faults. In Jefferson County, in contrast, salt-tectonic activity and growth faulting appear to have been coeval. Early salt-cored ridges continued to rise throughout Frio deposition; growth faults occur both updip and downdip. Hydrocarbons accumulated over the salt domes in growth-fault anticlines and in stratigraphic traps. Recognition that shelf-margin growth faulting preceded the development of the present pattern of domes and basins has important implications for hydrocarbon exploration. Growth faults may be migration paths for hydrocarbons; furthermore, early formed traps, distorted by salt movement, may still be found to contain hydrocarbons.
- Research Organization:
- Univ. of Texas, Austin
- OSTI ID:
- 6570725
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-8310301-
- Journal Information:
- Am. Assoc. Pet. Geol., Bull.; (United States), Vol. 67:9; Conference: American Association of Petroleum Geologists eastern section meeting, Carbondale, IL, USA, 3 Oct 1983
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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