A review of the geology and of the known hydrocarbon occurrences, in the thrust belt of the Apennines in Sicily and its marginal troughs, points to an insufficiently tested potential for commercial petroleum discoveries. The Central basin and the northwest margin of the offshore Trapani basin hold the most promise. The Central basin is a foretrough filled by over 5,000 m (16,400 ft) of clastics, with large gravity slides that originated in the southward Miocene-Pliocene progression of subsidence and substratum thrusting and gliding. Conditions appear to have been optimal for burial and maturation of deep, Triassic potential source rocks, as well as of organic matter in the Miocene deposits beneath or within the olistostromes, or both. There are two potential plays: gas pr duction in Oligocene and Miocene sands, and oil in deeper, Mesozoic carbonates. In the Trapani basin, oil accumulation in lower Miocene reservoirs is related to a Paleogene source-rock depocenter, which is buried under Neogene clays and a repetition of thrust sheets. Future exploration potential appears to be in the thrust belt itself, further to the northwest, rather than in the Neogene basin.

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