Instructor

Engr. Muhammad Yasir

Fundamentals of
Petroleum Engineering

Lecture 3 & 4
Geology and Exploration
Contents
• Rock Types
• Parameters Controlling Petroleum Occurrence
• Migration of Petroleum
•Entrapment of Petroleum
• Oil Exploration Methods
Rock Types
Igneous Rock
• Igneous rocks are crystalline solids which form directly
from the cooling of magma. This is an exothermic process
(it loses heat) and involves a phase change from the liquid
to the solid state.
•Igneous rocks are given names based upon two things:
composition (what they are made of) and texture (how big
the crystals are).
• Texture relates to how large the individual mineral grains
are in the final, solid rock. In most cases, the resulting grain
size depends on how quickly the magma cooled. In general,
the slower the cooling, the larger the crystals in the final
rock.
Rock Types
Igneous Rock
• The other factor is composition: the elements in the
magma directly affect which minerals are formed when
the magma cools.
•Example of Igneous Rocks: Granite and Basalt.

Granite Basalt
Rock Types
Sedimentary Rock
• Sedimentary rocks are called secondary, because they are
often the result of the accumulation of small pieces broken
off pre-existing rocks. This accumulation get compacted
and cemented together There are three main types of
sedimentary rocks: clastic, chemical and organic
sedimentary rocks.
• Clastic sedimentary rock:
• Clastic sedimentary rocks are accumulations of clasts - little
pieces of broken up rock which have compacted and
cemented.
• Example of clastic sedimentary rocks are sandstone, shale,
siltstone and conglomerate.
Rock Types
Sedimentary Rock
• Chemical sedimentary rock:
• Many of these form when standing water evaporates,
leaving dissolved minerals behind. Thick deposits of
salt and gypsum can form due to repeated flooding
and evaporation over long period of time .
• Example of chemical sedimentary rocks are gypsum
and dolomite.
Rock Types
Sedimentary Rock
• Organic sedimentary rock:
• Any accumulation of sedimentary debris caused by
organic processes. Many animals use calcium for
shells, bones, and teeth. These bits of calcium can
pile up on the seafloor and accumulate into a thick
enough layer to form an "organic" sedimentary rock.
• Example of organic sedimentary rocks are coal and
coquina.
Rock Types
Metamorphic Rock
• The metamorphic get their name from "meta" (change)
and "morph" (form).
• Any rock can become a metamorphic rock. All that is
required for the rock to be moved into an environment in
which the minerals which make up the rock become
unstable and out of equilibrium with the new
environmental conditions.
•In most cases, this involves burial which leads to a rise in
temperature and pressure. The metamorphic changes in
the minerals always move in a direction designed to
restore equilibrium.
• Common metamorphic rocks include slate, schist, gneiss,
and marble.
Parameters Controlling Petroleum Occurrence
1. Source Rocks
•Fine grained sediment that in its natural setting has
generated and released enough hydrocarbons to form a
commercial accumulation of oil and gas.
• Source rocks are clay or carbonate organic rich muds
deposited under low energy, reducing conditions.
• The most important factor in the generation of petroleum
in source rock is temperature.
• The action of heat on the insoluble organic matter
(kerogen) contained in source rocks leads to the formation
of oil and gas.
Parameters Controlling Petroleum Occurrence
2. Reservoir Rocks
• A petroleum reservoir is a porous and permeable rock in
communication with a mature source bed.
• Sandstones and carbonate rocks form the overwhelming
majority of reservoirs world-wide.
• Under special circumstances, igneous and metamorphic
rocks can also act as petroleum reservoirs.
Parameters Controlling Petroleum Occurrence
3. Traps
• A traps is an arrangement of rock layers that contains
an accumulation of hydrocarbons yet prevents them
from rising to the surface.
• The trap consists of an impermeable layer of rock
above a porous, permeable layer containing the
hydrocarbons.
• It can be structural traps or stratigraphic traps or
combination of these factors. Structural traps occur
when the reservoir formation deforms. Stratigraphic
traps are those where porosity or permeability has
changed within a formation.
Migration of Petroleum
• Oil and gas move out of the source beds and
accumulate in the reservoir rocks.
• The transfer from source rocks to reservoir rocks is
called primary migration.
• Movement of petroleum within the porous and
permeable reservoirs beds is known as secondary
migration.
• The primary cause of movement of fluids is
compaction.
• The more permeable silt and sand bodies within
compacting muds are the main channels of fluid
migration.
Entrapment of Petroleum
• Oil, gas and water slowly migrate through permeable
rocks, driven by natural forces of gravity (buoyancy) and
pressure gradients.
• When they meet an impermeable barrier, they can go
no further, so oil and gas accumulate. This barrier is
generally referred to as a trap.
• Varying densities make the gas phase rise, while the
water settles to the lowest point, and the oil remains in
the middle.
• Traps may be classified according to the manner in
which they are formed, and categorized as structural
trap, stratigraphic trap and combination trap.
 Structural Trap
• By far the greatest number of fields
discovered world-wide and the largest
proportion of total proven reserves
are associated with structural traps.
• Structural traps result from a local
deformation such as folding and/or Anticlinal oil traps
faulting of the rock layers.
• Faulting can also produce traps by
juxtaposing a reservoir against an
impervious stratum.
Structural oil trap
caused by faulting
 Stratigraphic Traps
• Most basins contain facies changes, unconformities
with resulting truncated beds, and buried erosional or
constructive surfaces such as reefs, hills, barrier sand
bars, channels, and other related geologic phenomena
which form the basic requirements for the creation of
stratigraphic traps.
• Stratigraphic trap is a general term for traps that are
chiefly the result of a lateral variation in the lithology of
the reservoir rock, or a break in its continuity. A
permeable reservoir rock changes to a less permeable
or to an impermeable rock.
• Two common types of stratigraphic traps are Pinchout
Type and Truncated Type.
 Oil Exploration Method
• In the early days of petroleum, most oil finds were
the result of digging or drilling near known oil and
gas seeps or of accidental finds while drilling for
water.
• A good definition of a seep is "the surface
expression of a migration pathway, along which
petroleum is currently flowing, driven by buoyancy
from a sub-surface origin'‘.
• At the most basic level, this demonstrates that the
basin contains a generating source rock and hence a
viable petroleum system
 Surface Geology
Remote Sensing Method

1. Magnetic Methods

2. Gravity Methods

3. Seismic Methods