SEQUENCE STRATIGRAPHY OF THE UPDIP SMACKOVER AND THE LOWER SMACKOVER BROWN DENSE IN EAST CENTRAL MISSISSIPPI

The Smackover Formation is an Upper Jurassic, post-rift, carbonate deposited in a relatively lower energy environment. However, the Lower Smackover Brown Dense (LSBD) is a relatively higher energy environment during eustatic sea level changes in the Oxfordian stage. The Smackover Formation is a known hydrocarbon reservoir and source rock for the Gulf Coast region that has been suggested to have further to contain 78 million barrels of oil, 160 billion cubic feet of gas, and 23 million barrels of natural gas liquids potential according to an assessment from the United States Geological Survey (USGS). Sequence stratigraphic methods can be used to determine the depositional environments and post-depositional changes in the updip Smackover and LSBD. This study uses past well records and descriptions, conventional core descriptions, sidewall core descriptions, well log analysis, and seismic to determine the facies and boundary surfaces of the shoaling upward cycles in the Smackover in East Central Mississippi. These observations will lead to interpretations that will test the hypothesis that a Highstand Systems Tract (HST) or Forced Regression Systems Tract (FRST) exists in the LSBD near the Peripheral Fault Trend. Potential results of this study could be a beach facies from interbedded sand in the LSBD, extensive dolomitization on paleotopographic highs, and syn-depositional faulting in the Smackover from the Peripheral Fault Trend.