Alves and Abreu Featured in Announced Talks

Oil and Gas Fields of the 22nd Century: The Quest for Economic and Environmental Sustainability on Continental Margins

Tiago Alves

Thursday, 10 September 2020 • 3:00 PM (SGT)
Presented by Tiago M. Alves
Reader in Earth Sciences, Cardiff University, United Kingdom

Economic oil and gas fields have been increasingly found in deep-water continental margins for the past decade, where potential prospects record the key tectonic events associated with plate breakup and continental drift. In these regions, the exploitation of economic resources must take into account sustainable practices and environmental concerns of local populations. This talk will present case studies from multiple continental margins to then extrapolate major findings to basins in Southeast Asia. Crucial geological aspects of Asian continental margins also found in other parts of the world, include: a) syn-rift strata that are strikingly thicker on new seismic data, and presumed older than previously assumed when interpreting vintage seismic profiles, b) an important control of basement type and fabric on tectonic subsidence and subsequent magmatism, and c) the need to manage the presence of important volumes of volatiles (NSOs), leading to combined hydrocarbon production and CO2 injection techniques in many a prospects. Examples of key prospects from the South Atlantic (Southeast Brazil), Equatorial Atlantic (North Brazil), and Northwest Australia (Timor Sea) will be compared with Asian cases studies from the South China Sea, Japan, and Pakistan. The talk will conclude with examples of environmental studies in the Levantine Basin that are of interest to the management of oil spills and floating debris throughout the Asian continent.

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Tiago M. Alves is a marine and petroleum geologist with extensive experience in the field and in offshore work. He leads the 3-D Seismic Laboratory at Cardiff University where he uses a range of datasets to understand how continental margins evolve from early rifting to their 'passive' and 'subduction' stages. Alves has vast experience in industrial and governmental work, including environmental studies concerning hydrocarbon-bearing regions, and areas posed for Geo-Energy solutions. Carbon sequestration, EOR, and more traditional Exploration Geology are themes of his research.

Alves is also a member of the Energy Systems Research Institute at Cardiff, and a section editor for Marine and Petroleum Geology.

A Simplified Guide to Sequence Stratigraphy

Vitor Abreu

Thursday, 24 September 2020 • 8:30 PM (SGT)
Presented by Vitor Abreu
Consultant, Houston

In the past three decades the sequence stratigraphy jargon has proliferated, resulting in multiple definitions of the same surface or new surfaces and units based on drawings of deposition in response to relative changes in sea level. The close association between base-level changes, the formation of surfaces, and specific stratal stacking that define systems tracts are at the heart of the confusion.

The talk proposes a back-to-basics approach, emphasizing key observations that can be made from any geologic data: lithofacies, lithofacies association, vertical stacking, stratal geometries, and stratal terminations. Parasequence stacking is a consequence of the interplay of accommodation and sediment supply, which are controlled by eustasy, tectonics, climate, and initial depositional profile.

Sequence stratigraphic surfaces are defined based on shoreline position and systems tracts are defined based on shoreline trajectory; therefore, shoreline position and trajectory are in fact the key observations to be made in a sequence stratigraphic interpretation. Terms like highstand, lowstand, and falling stage should be replaced by observation-based terms like "aggradation-progradation," "progradation-aggradation," and "degradation," respectively. Finally, research remains to be done on the relations between stratal stacking and various controls, and on the formation and chronostratigraphic significance of surfaces that demarcate changes in stacking.

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Vitor Abreu is an internationally recognized consultant, considered one of the world leaders in sequence stratigraphy and deep-water reservoirs. He has a Ph.D. from Rice University and 30 years of experience in the oil industry, retired from ExxonMobil in 2016 and currently the owner of Abreu Consulting and Training – ACT-GEO. Vitor evaluated and risked petroleum systems elements in 31 sedimentary basins in the seven continents.

Vitor is Past-President of the Society of Sedimentary Geology (SEPM) and Adjunct Professor at Rice University. He is the chief-editor of SEPM’s book “Sequence Stratigraphy of Siliciclastic Systems”, received the AAPG’s Jules Braunstein Memorial Award and was appointed AAPG’s inaugural International Distinguished Instructor.