Architecture, Sedimentary Infill And Petroleum Potential Of The Algerian Offshore

Thousands of kilometers of seismic reflection profiles, including deep seismic profiles, have been recently recorded in the Algerian offshore. Among this huge data base, two orthogonal profiles have been selected in the main depotcentre documented in the eastern part of the Algerian Basin, and used to update the structural model for both the Early Neogene rifting phase and subsequent Plio-Quaternary inversion operating along this currently active segment of the North African margin. For instance, the deep abyssal plain is still underlain by a thinned continental crust, Late Oligocene-Early Neogene (?) extension being controlled by the development of a narrow north-trending transtensional pull-apart basin. However, the southern part of the Algerian Basin has been subsequently inverted, both synrift series and pre-rift substratum being now locally exposed onshore within the Kabylides allochthon. As a whole, the deep Algerian offshore constitutes a foreland basin for the north-verging Plio-Quaternary thrusts imaged by recent seismic profiles beneath the continental slope, accounting for the south-ward dipping attitude of the Moho and east-trending attitude of the main Plio-Quaternary depotcentre, as expected for any thrust-related flexural basin. Because this frontier area remains almost unexplored in term of petroleum resources, with only a deep well (Habibas-1) in the west, and 2 shallow core-drills, Alger and Arzew, located west of Algiers, we have subsequently reviewed the potential and risk related to the various components of its petroleum systems. Assuming a realistic distribution of potential source rocks, a coupled kinematic-thermal and HC migration modelling has been performed along the north-trending profile, using the CERES code developed at IFP. The model results account for a very recent episode of HC generation and charge, most HC products being likely trapped beneath the Messinian salt