Relationship between diagenesis and reservoir quality in sandstones of the Garn Formation, Haltenbanken, mid-Norwegian continental shelf

A quantitative model is proposed for the dependence of porosity and permeability on diagenesis in subarkosic arenites of the Middle Jurassic Garn Formation. Porosity variation is controlled by the combined effects of compaction and quartz cementation. In general, more porosity has been lost by compaction than by quartz cementation, but compactional porosity loss appears to have occurred relatively early in the burial history (before burial below 2 km below the sea floor). Thus, progressive reduction of the total porosity with increasing burial below 2 km results mainly from quartz cementation. Permeability is a function of the abundance of intergranular macroporosity, which is interpreted to be a measure of "effective porosity." At depths less than 3.5 km below the sea floor, intergranular macroporosity generally comprises more than 50% of the total porosity, but at greater depth, as total porosity decreases below about 16%, the ratio of effective to ineffective porosity drops below one. This depth corresponds to the onset of extensive illitization and grain dissolution, which results in major reorganization of the pore system. Generation of secondary porosity by feldspar dissolution appears not to have been beneficial to reservoir quality in the Garn Formation, but it is regarded as an intrinsic part of the overall process of porosity destruction with increasing diagenesis.