HYPOTHETICAL HYDROCARBON SYSTEM IN THE SOUTHERN GALILEE BASIN, QUEENSLAND

The southern Galilee Basin in Queensland, Australia, is an understudied component of a broader Pennsylvanian to Triassic aged basin system in eastern Australia. Other components of this basin system – the Bowen and Cooper basins – are prolific hydrocarbon producers, however no discovery has been made the southern Galilee Basin. This region is under-explored compared to the Bowen and Cooper basins, with the wells present generally targeting the overlying Jurassic to Cretaceous Eromanga Basin or underlying Devonian Adavale Basin and overlooking the Galilee Basin interval.

Lateral equivalents of the major source bearing units in the Cooper and Bowen basins are present in the southern Galilee Basin, though controls on their source rock quality and maturity are scarce. Coal seams are present in the late Permian Bandanna Formation, though pilot testing for coal bed methane to the north is still on-going. Reservoirs and traps are likely to be channel sandstones associated with Pennsylvanian to early Permian glacial outflow channels or late Permian fluvial channels. The major regional seals in the Bowen and Cooper basins are a thick Triassic aged sequence of terrestrial mudstones.