ABSTRACT

The James Lime has been an exploration target since the discovery of the Fairway field in the East Texas basin in 1960. This study focuses on a deep James Lime gas discovery (4270 to 4422 m; 14,000 to 14,500 ft) in the Mississippi Salt basin made by Exxon in the early 1980's. The paleostructure association, lithofacies architecture, and reservoir quality revealed by the study of the James Lime in the Poplarville field provides guidance for exploring for other James Lime prospects.

Distribution of the James Lime reservoir facies is controlled by paleostructure associated with deeper buried salt structures. The lithofacies range from deeper water, low-energy wackestones and packstones to shallower water, higher-energy hydrozoa/cryptalgal stromatolite bindstones and requinid/coral packstones, grainstones, and boundstones. These lithofacies are laterally variable.

Reservoir quality is controlled by depositional facies and diagenesis. Nearly all porosity occurs in the requinid/coral packstones, grainstones, and boundstones. The pore networks consists mainly of ineffective moldic and microporosity with some interparticle porosity. Mean porosity of these textures is 6.5% and mean permeability is 0.16 md.

Exploration should be focused toward areas where paleotopography produced shoaling conditions during James Lime deposition. The requinid/coral packstones, grainstones, and boundstones will be the main pay; however, at depths greater than 4270 meters (14,000 ft) only marginal to fair reservoir quality should be expected.