Geomechanical rock properties of the Officer Basin
Adam H. E. Bailey A * , Liuqi Wang A , Dave N. Dewhurst B , Jade R. Anderson A , Lidena K. Carr A and Paul A. Henson AA Geoscience Australia, Canberra, ACT, Australia.
B CSIRO, Perth, WA, Australia.
The APPEA Journal 62 S385-S391 https://doi.org/10.1071/AJ21083
Accepted: 8 March 2022 Published: 13 May 2022
© 2022 The Author(s) (or their employer(s)). Published by CSIRO Publishing on behalf of APPEA. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY).
Abstract
The Officer Basin spanning South Australia and Western Australia is the focus of a regional stratigraphic study being undertaken as part of the Exploring for the Future (EFTF) program, an Australian Government initiative dedicated to increasing investment in resource exploration in Australia. Despite numerous demonstrated oil and gas shows, the Officer Basin remains a frontier basin for energy exploration with significant uncertainties due to data availability. Under the EFTF Officer–Musgrave Project, Geoscience Australia acquired new geomechanical rock property data from forty core samples in five legacy stratigraphic and petroleum exploration wells that intersected Paleozoic and Neoproterozoic aged intervals. These samples were subjected to unconfined compressive rock strength tests, Brazilian tensile strength tests and laboratory ultrasonic measurements. Petrophysical properties were also characterised via X-ray computerised tomography scanning, grain density and porosity-permeability analysis. Accurate characterisation of static geomechanical rock properties through laboratory testing is essential. In the modern exploration environment, these datasets are a precompetitive resource that can simplify investment decisions in prospective frontier regions such as the Officer Basin.
Keywords: Exploring for the Future, geomechanics, laboratory testing, Neoproterozoic Basins, Officer Basin, Officer-Musgrave Project, Paleozoic Basins, petrophysics, Poisson’s ratio, rock properties, static to dynamic, unconfined compressive strength, unconventional hydrocarbons, Young’s modulus.
Adam H. E. Bailey is a Petroleum Geoscientist at Geoscience Australia, with expertise in petroleum geomechanics, structural geology and basin analysis. He graduated with a BSc (Hons) in 2012 and a PhD in 2016 from the Australian School of Petroleum at the University of Adelaide. Adam is currently part of the Onshore Energy Systems team at Geoscience Australia, where he is currently working on the flagship Exploring for the Future program in Northern Australia. |
Liuqi Wang is a Well Analyst at Geoscience Australia working in the Minerals, Energy and Groundwater Division. He received his PhD in Petroleum Engineering and worked as a research fellow at the University of New South Wales before joining Geoscience Australia. His research interests include petrophysics, static and dynamic reservoir modelling, applied statistics and artificial intelligence. He is a member of PESA and EAGE. |
Dave N. Dewhurst is a Chief Research Scientist at CSIRO Energy in Perth. He holds a BSc (Hons) in Geology from the University of Sheffield (UK) and a PhD in Physics from the University of Newcastle upon Tyne (UK). He previously held post-doctoral positions at the University of Birmingham (UK), the University of Newcastle upon Tyne (UK), the Institut Français du Pétrole near Paris and Imperial College, London, before moving to CSIRO in 1998. He works on mechanical and physical properties of rocks for petroleum exploration and development, specialising in overburden and gas shales, as well as reservoir and seal evaluation for geological storage of CO2 and other gases. |
Jade R. Anderson completed a PhD at the University of Adelaide in the areas of Metamorphic Geology, Geochronology and Proterozoic Australia Tectonics in 2015. Jade now works as a Geoscientist in basin systems at Geoscience Australia. |
Lidena K. Carr is a Geoscientist for the Onshore Energy Systems Directorate, Basins Systems Branch, Minerals, Energy and Groundwater Division at Geoscience Australia. She graduated from the Australian National University with a BA/BSc (Hons) in 2004, with a major in Geology and Human Ecology. In 2007, she joined Geoscience Australia and then ACRES (satellite imagery), before moving to her current position as a Seismic Interpreter and Basin Analyst. She currently works within the Exploring for the Future program and a member of GSA. |
Paul A. Henson graduated from the University of Tasmania and is currently the Director of the Onshore Energy Systems section at Geoscience Australia. He has extensive experience in the minerals sector working on mineral systems in Proterozoic and Archaean terranes. Since 2010, he has led the Australian Governments’ onshore carbon storage program, undertaking deep onshore drilling and seismic acquisition programs in collaboration with the states and industry. He now manages the EFTF energy program leading to a team of researchers to acquire new pre-competitive geoscientific data to improve our understanding of the oil and gas potential of Australian onshore basins. |
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