THE GULF OF MEXICO ORIGIN, ITS SEDIMENTARY BASINS AND TYPE AND ABUNDANCE OF HYDROCARBONS DEPOSITS, WERE MAINLY THE PRODUCT OF A HOT SPOT EVOLUTION, SINCE EARLY MIDDLE JURASSIC TIME

The Gulf of Mexico origin, based on the existence of a hot spot (sensu J. Tuzo Wilson, 1963) with triple junction, allows understanding the origin of the “Hispanic Corridor”, the oil and gas systems, and the hydrocarbon deposits found in Texas-Louisiana sub-plate and in Mexican Petroleum basins. This model is based on redbeds, conglomerates and salt palynostratigraphy data obtained from Mexican Oil Basins. It has implications about the origin and evolution of the Texas-Louisiana subplate, delimited by the Lewis-Clark and Texas-Boquillas-Sabinas megashears, its northwestward movement and the 800 km displacement of the Ouachita System and its relation to tectonic phenomena in the Pacific subduction region during the Sevier and Laramide orogenies; also, about origin and evolution of the Western Region of Mexico, the Chiapas-Yucatán subplates and their Gulf Oil and Gas Basins.

A hot spot appeared during Late Liassic at the intersection of Precambrian Texas-Boquillas-Sabinas and Paleozoic Tampico-Lázaro Cárdenas megashears, at the central part of the present Gulf of Mexico. During doming stage, huge volumes of cratonic metamorphic rocks were eroded and quarzose sediments transported by fluvial systems toward W and SW. An initial RRR triple junction system was formed, composed by the SE-NW Texas-Boquillas-Sabinas, the SW-NE Campeche Escarpement and the N-S Nautla-Pico de Orizaba arms, bordering the Texas-Louisiana, Western Region of Mexico, and Chiapas-Yucatán subplates. Because the last one was still joined to South American plate, it was stable during Jurassic, and only Texas-Louisiana and Western Region of Mexico subplates were displaced northwestward, because the Texas-Boquillas-Sabinas and the Vancouver-Bahamas megashears reactivated and a subduction zone existed at the Pacific border of the North-American Plate. This motion allowed the Campeche Escarpement and Nautla-Pico de Orizaba arms became wider ridges and seafloor spreading zones, where the Gulf of Mexico formed.

Since Bajocian time, follow the rifting, sinking and drifting stages, giving origin to the “Hispanic Corridor”, to the Gulf of Mexico and its sedimentary sub-basins, to their oil and gas systems, and type and abundance of hydrocarbons found there, mainly as the product of this hot spot evolution since early Middle Jurassic time.