Fine-Grained Turbidite Systems

This Memoir covers one of the most important and active exploration reservoirs being pursued by geoscientists worldwide: fine-grained turbidite systems. 28 chapters show the results of an intense research effort in the 1990s that resulted from the discovery of large hydrocarbon accumulations in fine-grained turbidite systems in Brazil, the Gulf of Mexico, West Africa, and the North Sea. Industry and academia have joined together in this publication and the result is a unique opportunity to study these turbidite systems from the outcrop to the modeling; through the interpretation with 2-D and 3-D seismic data; to case histories and analog studies from Arkansas and Oklahoma, South and West Africa, Gulf of Mexico, west Texas, and New Zealand.
A Process Model for the Evolution of Submarine Fan Channels: Implications for Sedimentary Architecture
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Published:January 01, 2000
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CiteCitation
J. Peakall, W. D. McCaffrey, B. C. Kneller, C. E. Stelting, T. R. McHargue, W. J. Schweller, 2000. "A Process Model for the Evolution of Submarine Fan Channels: Implications for Sedimentary Architecture", Fine-Grained Turbidite Systems, Arnold H. Bouma, Charles G. Stone
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Abstract
Medium- to high-sinuosity, aggradational submarine channels have frequently been considered analogous to subaerial channels. However, planform evolution and resulting architecture in these submarine channels are characterized by absence of downstream migration, eventual cessation of movement, and ribbon geometries. In contrast, alluvial rivers undergo continuous downstream and lateral movement to form tabular, sheetlike bodies. A simple process model of flow structure and evolution is described for these submarine channels. Flows are predicted to be highly stratified, have significant supra-levee thicknesses, and form broad over-bank wedges of low-concentration fluid. The model, for the first time, provides a coherent set of process explanations for the primary observations of submarine channels.