About This Item

Share This Item

The AAPG/Datapages Combined Publications Database

AAPG Bulletin

Abstract

AAPG Bulletin, V. 90, No. 9 (September 2006), P. 1425-1447.

Copyright copy2006. The American Association of Petroleum Geologists. All rights reserved.

DOI:10.1306/03230605076

Longmen Shan fold-thrust belt and its relation to the western Sichuan Basin in central China: New insights from hydrocarbon exploration

Dong Jia,1 Guoqi Wei,2 Zhuxin Chen,3 Benliang Li,4 Qing Zeng,5 Guang Yang6

1Department of Earth Sciences, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210093, People's Republic of China; [email protected]
2Research Institute of Petroleum Exploration and Development, Langfang Branch, PetroChina Company Limited, Langfang 065007, People's Republic of China; [email protected]
3Department of Earth Sciences, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210093, People's Republic of China; [email protected]
4Research Institute of Petroleum Exploration and Development, Langfang Branch, PetroChina Company Limited, Langfang 065007, People's Republic of China; [email protected]
5Southwest Oil amp Gasfield Company, PetroChina Company Limited, Chengdu 610051, People's Republic of China; [email protected]
6Southwest Oil amp Gasfield Company, PetroChina Company Limited, Chengdu 610051, People's Republic of China

ABSTRACT

The Longmen Shan fold-thrust belt is one of the key regions of demonstrable Mesozoic–Cenozoic tectonic evolution in China, and the Sichuan Basin was the first natural-gas-producing area in China. In this article, the structural features of the Longmen Shan belt are presented, using both seismic profiles and field data. The complex structures of the northeast-trending Longmen Shan fold-thrust belt and its foreland in the western Sichuan Basin are formed by southeast-directed thrusting. Several eastward-verging, rootless thrust sheets and imbricates of Cambrian–Triassic rocks have been recognized in the northern Longmen Shan belt. Evidence suggests that the northern Longmen Shan belt experienced at least two major periods of deformation in the Late Triassic and Cenozoic. However, the southern Longmen Shan belt is represented by the basement-involved thrust structures and klippen, and its major periods of deformation were in the latest Cretaceous–early Cenozoic. Sedimentary features in the western Sichuan Basin reflect a two-phase flexural-loading history and illustrate that the Late Triassic foreland basin extends along the foredeep of the entire length of the Longmen Shan belt, but the uppermost Cretaceous–Paleogene rejuvenated foreland basin is restricted in the southern part of the western Sichuan Basin.

Structural geometries suggest that prospective traps are mainly developed in the frontal zone of the Longmen Shan fold-thrust belt and in the southern part of the western Sichuan Basin. One of the major contributions of this article is finding preexisting Paleozoic rift basins under the Cenozoic thin-skinned thrust belts, which represent a new potential hydrocarbon play.

Pay-Per-View Purchase Options

The article is available through a document delivery service. Explain these Purchase Options.

Watermarked PDF Document: $14
Open PDF Document: $24

AAPG Member?

Please login with your Member username and password.

Members of AAPG receive access to the full AAPG Bulletin Archives as part of their membership. For more information, contact the AAPG Membership Department at [email protected].

<