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Oil & Gas Engineering Dept. Petroleum Geology / 3 MSc. Hussein A.

Petroleum System
( Part One )

The Source Rocks

Petroleum System Processes

Generation - Burial of source rock to temperature and
pressure regime sufficient to convert organic matter into
hydrocarbon.
Migration - Movement of hydrocarbon out of the source rock
toward and into a trap.
Accumulation - A volume of hydrocarbon migrating into a trap
faster than the trap leaks resulting in an accumulation.
Preservation - Hydrocarbon remains in reservoir and is not
altered by biodegradation or “water-washing”.
Timing -Trap forms before and during hydrocarbon migrating.
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Petroleum source beds are fine grained, clay-rich siliclastic rocks (mudstones,
shales) or dark coloured carbonate rocks (limestones, marlstones), which have
generated and effectively expelled hydrocarbons.

Most of the petroleum is sourced from cyclically bedded Jurassic shales and
carbonates (Callovian-Oxfordian- Kimmeridgian ages). (In Iraq).

Good quality petroleum source rocks can be deposited in marine or lakes

environments as organic-matter-rich muds providing that bottom waters are oxygen-
deficient, i.e. that reducing conditions prevail.

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For the source rock to be prolific potential (Tissot and Welte, 1984; Hunt, 1996;
and Johnson et al., 2003) they should have the following peculiars available:
1- Good quantity of total organic carbon (TOC) more than 0.5%.
2- Kerogen should be mostly from types (I) and (II) in chemical analysis and the type of
organic matter is amorphous organic matter (AOM), and from type (A) and (D) in
microscopic test.
3- Thermal maturity should be mature enough for oil generation.

At the beginning of this lesson it is necessary to give the definitions of some terms
and basic indications for assessment of source rocks to be the base in explaining the
sequence of works in this lesson:
1- Total organic carbon (TOC): It represents the total organic carbon measured in
percentage from the total weight of the rock.
2- S1: Hydrocarbons present in the rock in free form and which are librated at
temperatures less than 300Cº and measured in milligram hydrocarbon/gram from the
rock.
3- S2: Hydrocarbons which resulted from the crack of kerogen in high temperatures
(300Cº-500Cº) and measured in milligram hydrocarbon/gram from the rock.
4- S3: Organic carbon dioxide released between 300º and 390Cº.

5- Maximum temperature (Tmax.): It represents the temperature of higher oil

production at (S2) and it is measured in degree centigrade. It is used in measurements

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of the organic matter and its maturation.

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6- Hydrogen index (HI): It represents the ratio range and hydrogen activity
in organic matter to produce hydrocarbons, it can be gotten mathematically
by the equality of S2 on the total organic matter measured in (mg HC/g TOC).
7- Oxygen index (OI): It represents the ratio range and oxygen activity in
organic matter to produce hydrocarbons, it can be gotten mathematically by
the equality of S3 on the total organic matter measured in (mg CO2/g TOC).
8- Petroleum potential (PP): It represents production potential for
hydrocarbon group form the source rocks included in maturity and it is
measured from the sum of S1 and S2 pours from pyrolysis device through
the rock.
9- Production index (PI) = S1/ (S1+S2) Oil window = 0.08 - 0.4. Higher values
are often due to migrating hydrocarbons or contaminants. 9

The origin of hydrocarbons belongs to the sedimentary organic matters derived

from living organic matter, which is called kerogen in petroleum geology (Staplin,

1969; and Horsfield, 1997).

Kerogen is defined as organic material with a high molecular weight is not

soluble in organic solvents and acids (HCL, HF) and consists of the remains of micro-
organisms with plants and plankton.
Kerogen in rocks has four principle sources: marine, lacustrine, terrestrial, and
recycled. The relative ability of source rock to generate petroleum defined by its
kerogen quantity (TOC) and quality (high or low in hydrogen). Whether or not it has
generated petroleum is defined by its state of maturation (immature, mature, or post-
mature with respect to oil) (Hunt, 1996). The term source rock applies irrespective of
whether the organic matter is mature or immature. Source rock quality is defined in
terms of amount and type of kerogen and bitumen and its stage of maturity.

For Kerogen to change to the hydrocarbons have to go through the stage of

maturity that lead to changes in physical and chemical on their characteristics, for
example, breaking C-C bonds in the form of rings is saturated, which increases the
aromaticity and the change in the production index (PI), the maximum temperature 10
(Tmax) and vetrinite reflectance (Ro) (Tissot and Welte, 1984).

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Palaeoenvironments of source rocks:

i. Large anoxic lakes.

ii. Anoxic layer in open marine.
iii. Delta with high subsidence.
iv. Lagoon with high subsidence.
v. Anoxic layer by upwelling.
vi. Anoxic basin with igneous borders.

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Classification of source rocks for oil:

Effective
(Any sedimentary rock that has already generated and expelled hydrocarbons).

Possible
(Any sedimentary rocks whose potential has not yet been known, but which are
capable of generating and expelling hydrocarbons).

Potential source rocks

(Potential source rocks are any immature sedimentary rocks known to be capable of
generating and expelling hydrocarbons if their levels of thermal maturity were higher).

Types of source rocks:

Argillaceous limestone rocks.

Shaly marly limestone rocks.

Shale rocks. 12

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Maturation of Source Rocks:

Kerogen is composed of large hydrocarbon molecules that are stable at

low temperatures, but will break down into smaller molecules of liquid and
gaseous hydrocarbon compounds with progressive exposure to higher
temperatures. In addition, non hydrocarbon gases such as Co2 and H2O are
produced, and a nonreactive residue remains. This transformation is controlled
by the reaction kinetics and the most important control is temperature (Tissot et
al., 1987). Lesser controls are the nature and abundance of the kerogen in the
source rock and pressure. Significant oil generation occurs between
o
temperatures approximately 60 and 120 C, and significant gas generation
between 120 and 225oC, above 225oC the kerogen is inert, having expelled all
hydrocarbons; only carbon remains as graphite (Selley, 1998).
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The maturation of kerogen can be measured by several

techniques as maturation indicators:
1. Vitrinite Reflectance (Ro):
Vitrinite reflectance technique is used to assess the rank of coal samples.
Basically, the shininess of coal increases with rank from peat to anthracite.
This reflectance can be measured optically. Empirically there is a relationship
between vitrinite reflectance and hydrocarbon generation. Crude oil
generation occurs for (Ro) values between 0.6 and 1.5, gas generation takes
place between 1.5 and 3.0; at values above 3.0 the rocks are essentially
graphitic and devoid of hydrocarbons (Selley, 1998).
Vitrinite reflectance is the most widely used indicator of thermal stress,
because it extends over a longer maturity range than any other indicator.

Ro: is calculated theoretically according to the following equation:

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Ro = (Tmax. 0.0180) - 7.16 ................ (Jarvie et al., 1991)

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1. Chia gara Fn. of oceanic anoxic

sediment, Ajeel Oil Field.

2. Lower Fars Fn. of wide anoxic

lakes, Qaiyarah Oil Field.

3. Zubair Fn. of deltaic sediment of

high rate subsidence, West Qurna
Oil Field.

4. Akkas Fn. of anoxic sediment

under upwelling currents, Akkas
Gas Field. 15

Plate: Microscopic description to kerogen with amorphous

structures (Thompson & Dembicki, 1986)

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2. Maximum temperature (Tmax.):

Tmax means a Rock-Eval pyrolysis thermal maturity parameter based on
the temperature at which the maximum amount of pyrolyzate (S2) is
generated from the kerogen in a rock sample. The beginning and end of the
oil-generative window approximately correspond to Tmax of 430oC and
470oC, respectively (Peters, 1986).

The temperature Tmax is influenced by the type of organic matter during

the diagenetic stage and the beginning of catagenesis. It is lower in the
terrestrial kerogen of type III and higher in the marine or lacustrine type I
and II. However, the Tmax values are almost equivalent for the different
kerogen types in the peak zone of oil generation and later in the gas zone.
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3. Production Index (PI):

Rock-Eval pyrolysis production index (S1/S1+S2) can be used to estimate
thermal maturity, Rock-Eval. PI value less than 0.1 indicates immature
organic matter that generates little or no petroleum.

PI reaches approximately 0.4 at the bottom of the oil window (beginning

of the wet gas zone) and can increase to as high as 1.0 when the
hydrocarbon-generative capacity of the kerogen has been exhausted (Peters
et al., 2005).

PI is meaningless, if the S2 is below 0.2. Many high PI values above 1mg

HC/g TOC indicate migrated oil, especially if the Tmax decreases and the TOC
increases at the same time (Hunt, 1996).
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Other Maturation Indicators:

Several approaches to quantify the degree of maturation have been

proposed aside from the TTI. Most of them are sensitive to temperature

and time.

4. Thermal Alteration Index (TAI) measures the color of finely dispersed

organic matter on a scale from 1 (pale yellow) to 5 (black). This index has a

poor sensitivity within the oil window (TAI around 2.5 to 3.0) and is not

generally used.

5. Level of Organic Maturation (LOM) is based on coal ranks and is adjusted

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to give a linear scale.

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Purposes of Maturation Indicators:

To recognize and evaluate potential source rocks for oil and gas by
measuring their contents in organic carbon and their thermal maturities
To correlate oil types with probable source beds through their
geochemical characteristics and the optical properties of kerogen in the
source beds
To determine the time of hydrocarbon generation, migration and
accumulation
To estimate the volumes of hydrocarbons generated and thus to assess
possible reserves and losses of hydrocarbons in the system.
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Evaluation of Source Rocks:

There are many geochemical tools such as total organic

carbon (TOC), Rock-Eval (Pyrolysis), Vitrinite Reflectance
(Ro), and kerogen atomic hydrogen/carbon (H/C) which
can be used to evaluate the rock samples, these practical
and less expensive methods allow non-source rocks to be
identified and source rock to be provisionally grouped into
genetic families, the effective petroleum source rock must
satisfy requirements as to the quantity, quality, and thermal
maturity of the organic matter.
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1- Finding the Total Organic Carbon (TOC):

The total organic carbon (TOC) that can be approximately

evaluated, but its ratio and degree of preservation in the
sedimentary basin are affected by many factors such as:
sedimentary environment, rate of deposition, proximal and
distal from coast line, evaporation quantity and ratio of
redeposition (Stein, 1986; and Tyson, 1995).
To measure the total present organic matters in sediments
which form oil LeCO method was used in laboratories of
GeoMark Research Inc., in Texas, America. 24

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2- Rock-Eval (Pyrolysis):

Rock Eval is a commercial technique for the anhydrous pyrolysis of

source rocks developed by the Institute Francais du Petrole (IFP).
About 100mg of pulverized source rock sample is put in the small oven
controlled by temperature programmer. There are two automatic pyrolysis
steps, the first being an initial volatilization of pre-exist hydrocarbons in
the source rock at 300°C. This produces the peak area S1. The second step
is the conversion of kerogen to hydrocarbons by increasing the sample
temperature to 550°C. This produces the peak area S2. Carbon dioxide
produced during the pyrolysis is collected and is the peak area S3. HI is
calculated from S2/TOC, and OI is calculated from S3/TOC. Tmax is the
temperature, in °C, at which the pyrolytic yield of hydrocarbons from a
rock samples reaches its maximum. 25

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Table 1: Geochemical indicators for source rocks efficiency

(Peters and Cassa, 1994)

TOC S1 S2 PP
Quantity
(wt. % ) (mg H C / g roc k) (mg H C / g roc k) (mg H C / g roc k)

Poor 0.0-0.5 0.0-0.5 0.0-2.5 0.0-3.0

Fair 0.5-1.0 0.5-1.0 2.5-5.0 3.0-6.0

Good 1.0-2.0 1.0-2.0 5.0-10.0 6.0-12.0

Very Good >2.0 >2.0 10.0-20.0 12.0-24.0

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Table 2: Rock-Eval Pyrolysis data of the studied samples

(GeoMark Laboratories)

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Examples of the source rocks in Iraq

1. Najmah Limestone Formation
2. Yamama Formation
3. Sulaiy Formation
4. Ratawi Formation
5. Zubair Formation
6. Nahr Umr Formation
7. Sargelu Formation

8. Chia Zairi Formation

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