About This Item

Share This Item

The AAPG/Datapages Combined Publications Database

Houston Geological Society Bulletin

Abstract


Houston Geological Society Bulletin, Volume 37, No. 2, October 1994. Pages 11-11.

Abstract: Sequence Stratigraphy of Aggrading and Backstepping Carbonate Shelves, Oligocene, Central Kalimantan, Indonesia

By

Arthur Saller
Unocal Corporation, Brea, California

Four major Oligocene carbonate sequences were studied in the Teweh area of Central Kalimantan, Indonesia, to better understand how they might serve as reservoirs for hydrocarbons in the area. Each sequence (200-500 m thick) was delineated in outcrops and/or on seismic lines: (1) early Oligocene, (2) middle Oligocene, (3) early late Oligocene, and (4) middle to late Late Oligocene. In landward areas to the south, sequence 1 consists mainly of sandstones and shales with thin limestone beds. Isolated carbonate buildups and shales occur in basinal areas to the north in sequence 1. An erosional unconformity separates sequences 1 and 2. During deposition of sequences 2-4, carbonate shelves developed in the southern part of the Teweh area, while shales were deposited in basinal environments to the north. The carbonate shelf margin of sequence 2 was established along a structural hinge line. Boundaries between sequences 2-4 do not show onlap or erosional truncation in this area. On seismic lines, boundaries between carbonate sequences 2-4 are defined by surfaces of renewed carbonate growth (mounding and/or downlap) on the shelf immediately above the sequence boundary. Subaerial unconformities were not found in or between sequences 2-4 on outcrop, so boundaries between sequences 2, 3, and 4 were placed where strata first indicated a substantial deepening of depositional environments. Rapid rises in relative sea level (subsidence + eustatic sea level) resulted in drowning and "backstepping" of carbonate shelf margins in some locations, and stacking of shelf margins in other locations.

Internally, the carbonate shelves of sequences 2 and 3 are characterized by vertically building shelf margins with landward-dipping (south-dipping), shingled clinoforms indicating progradation of shallow carbonate environments from the shelf margin into the lagoon. Sequences 2 and 3 have well-developed transgressive systems tracts overlain by highstand systems tracts. In outcrop, the transgressive systems tracts contain interbedded large-foram wackestones/ packstones and coral wackestones/packstones with poorly defined facies belts. The highstand systems tracts are characterized by well-developed facies belts which include from the basin shelfward: (1) shale and carbonate debris flows deposited on the lower slope; (2) argillaceous large-foram wackestones on the upper slope; (3) discontinuous coral wackestones and boundstones in bioclastic packstones on the shelf edge; (4) coralline-algae, large-foram packstones and grainstones of back reef flats and shelf-margin shoals; and (5) thin-branching coral and foraminifera1 wackestones and packstones in the lagoon. Seismic lines show the carbonate shelf of sequence 4 as a massive buildup which thins substantially into the basin.

End_of_Record - Last_Page 11---------------

 

Copyright © 2005 by Houston Geological Society. All rights reserved.