Evolution of the Arctic Alaska Sedimentary Basin

Arctic ocean mega project: Paper 2 – Arctic stratigraphy and regional tectonic structure

“…The following data formed the basis for establishing the chronostratigraphic framework of the Arctic Ocean: (1) drilling data from the Lomonosov Ridge acquired within the ACEX Project (Moran et al, 2006;Backman et al, 2008), (2) age data of linear magnetic anomalies of the Eurasia Basin (Glebovsky et al, 2006;Gaina et al, 2011), (3) age data of the sedimentary cover of the Chukchi Sea Shelf based on well ties (Kumar et al, 2011;Hegewald and Jokat, 2013;Houseknecht and Wartes, 2013;Nikishin et al, 2014Nikishin et al, , 2017Nikishin et al, , 2019Aleksandrova, 2016;Craddock and Houseknecht, 2016;Houseknecht et al, 2016;Ilhan and Coakley, 2018;Popova et al, 2018;Homza and Bergman, 2019;Houseknecht, 2019b;Houseknecht, 2019a;Skaryatin et al, 2020), (4) data on formation history of Mesozoic orogens on islands in the East Siberian and Chukchi Seas, (5) data on ages of De Long and Alpha-Mendeleev Rise basalts, which are a part of the Alpha-Mendeleev LIP or HALIP (Drachev and Saunders, 2006;Grantz et al, 2011;Morozov et al, 2013;Brumley, 2014;Coakley et al, 2016;Mukasa et al, 2020), (6) data on climate stratigraphy (Backman and Moran, 2009;Stein et al, 2015), and (7) other miscellaneous data.…”

“…The most complete Cenozoic section, which includes Eocene deposits, is penetrated by the Popcorn-1 well (Sherwood et al, 2002;Ilhan and Coakley, 2018;Homza and Bergman, 2019;Houseknecht, 2019aHouseknecht, , 2019b. The Eocene section is divided into three units: the Lower Eocene, the Middle Eocene and the Upper Eocene.…”

Assessment of undiscovered oil and gas resources in the Central North Slope of Alaska, 2020

“…Rich, oil-prone source rocks are in the Ellesmerian, Beaufortian, and Brookian Sequences in various parts of the assessment area (Houseknecht, 2019a). Studies of oil geochemistry from producing oil fields indicate that certain oil accumulations were sourced mainly from one of those source rocks and that many oil accumulations represent mixtures of oil from two or more of those source rocks (for example, Wang and others, 2014).…”

“…Six assessment units (AUs) were defined in the Ellesmerian, Beaufortian, and Brookian Sequences, all of which contain known and potential reservoirs (Houseknecht, 2019a). Ellesmerian and Beaufortian strata are each divided into north and south AUs.…”

“…(1) Mississippian to Triassic Ellesmerian Sequence, (2) Jurassic to Lower Cretaceous (Hauterivian) Beaufortian Sequence, and (3) Lower Cretaceous (post-Hauterivian) to Tertiary Brookian Sequence (Houseknecht, 2019a). Much of the historical oil exploration in the central North Slope has focused on the Ellesmerian Sequence, which includes the main oil reservoirs at the supergiant Prudhoe Bay Field (the largest conventional oil field in North America), and the Beaufortian Sequence, which includes the main reservoirs at the Kuparuk River Field (the second largest oil field in Alaska).…”