Part 4 - Berg - Hughes Center

heat flow results in thermogenic gas generation being initiated at a depth of 12,000 feet
for the North Louisiana Salt Basin compared to a depth of 16,500 feet for the Mississippi
Interior Salt Basin.
Initial Resource Reservoir Assessment
The assessment of the undiscovered and underdeveloped reservoirs of the North
Louisiana Salt Basin was made based on the oil and gas production reported from the
reservoirs in the North Louisiana Salt Basin and from the reservoirs in the Mississippi
Interior Salt Basin (Table 2), and on the results from the basin analysis study of these
basins. The potential undiscovered reservoirs in the North Louisiana Salt Basin are
Triassic Eagle Mills sandstone and deeply buried Upper Jurassic sandstone and
limestone. Potential underdeveloped reservoirs include Lower Cretaceous sandstone and
limestone and Upper Cretaceous sandstone.
Smackover Petroleum System
The Smackover petroleum system was characterized for the Mississippi Interior
Salt Basin in Mancini et al. (2003) and in our 2006 DOE report on the resource
assessment of the deep gas resource of the onshore interior salt basins for the North
Louisiana Salt Basin (Mancini et al., 2006, 2008). The description of this petroleum
system is summarized as follows. The underburden rocks include Paleozoic crystalline
and sedimentary rocks, Upper Triassic to Lower Jurassic graben-fill red beds, Middle
Jurassic evaporates, and Upper Jurassic siliciclastics, and the overburden strata consist of
Upper Jurassic, Cretaceous, and Tertiary deposits (Mancini et al., 2003, 2008) (Fig. 328).
Lower to middle lime mudstone beds of the Upper Jurassic Smackover Formation serve
as the regional source rocks for the onshore salt basins (Oehler, 1984; Sassen et al.,
387