Geoscience Australia’s Exploring for the Future (EFTF) program has established new techniques to collect onshore pre-competitive datasets on an unprecedented scale. The Exploration Incentive Scheme (EIS) is a Western Australian Government initiative that aims to encourage exploration for the long-term sustainability of the state’s resources sector. Integration of EFTF and EIS datasets has improved understanding of the geology across northern Australia, and the associated energy, mineral and groundwater resources potential.
The onshore Canning Basin covers approximately 530 000 km2, and has proven prospectivity for conventional oil and gas, mainly in the northern part of the basin. Potential exists for unconventional resources that remain largely unexplored and untested. Gas resource assessments suggest that the basin has significant potential for recoverable shale gas and tight gas. Even with exploration continuing along the flanks of the Fitzroy Trough, the Canning Basin remains one of the least explored Paleozoic basins in the world (DMIRS, 2020).
Australia’s longest onshore seismic line, 18GA-KB1, acquired in the southern Canning Basin addresses a long standing data gap across the Kidson Sub-basin and Waukarlycarly Embayment that assists with the resource evaluation of this frontier region. The Kidson Sub-basin covers 91 000 km2 and has a sag basin architecture. Preliminary interpretation of the seismic data indicates that the sedimentary basin is approximately 6 km deep, and includes a conformable package of Ordovician–Devonian siliciclastic, carbonate and evaporite facies of exploration interest. The Carboniferous succession is interpreted as not being present. Located on the western end of the seismic line, the newly drilled deep stratigraphic well Waukarlycarly 1 penetrated 2680.53 m of Cenozoic and Paleozoic strata and provides stratigraphic control for the geology imaged in the Waukarlycarly Embayment. A comprehensive elemental and δ13C isotope chemostratigraphy study assists with stratigraphic correlations within Ordovician sedimentary strata across the region (Forbes et al., 2020a, b).
Oil and gas discoveries throughout the Canning Basin were generated from Paleozoic marine source rocks, deposited under stratified oxic and euxinic water columns. Three distinct petroleum systems, the Ordovician (Larapintine 2), Late Devonian (Larapintine 3) and latest Devonian–early Carboniferous (Larapintine 4), are recognized based on the geochemical character of their associated fluids and each display strong stratigraphic control (Carr et al., 2020). Widespread generation of gas from Paleozoic sources is evident from molecular analyses of gases recovered from petroleum wells and fluid inclusions (Boreham et al., 2020). Currently the Larapintine 2 Petroleum System is deemed most prospective system in the Kidson Sub-basin.
