Ambrose, William A.1, Tim F. Wawrzyniec2, Khaled Fouad3,
L. F. Brown3, Shinichi Sakurai3, David C. Jennette3,
Edgar H. Guevara3, Mario Aranda Garcia4, Ulises Hernández Romano4,
Ramón Cárdenas Hernández4, Eduardo Macías Zamora5, Suhas C.
Talukdar6
(1) Bureau of Economic Geology, Jackson School of Geosciences, The University of Texas at
Austin, Austin, TX
(2) The University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM
(3) Bureau of Economic Geology
(4) Pemex Exploración y Producción, Poza Rica, Mexico
(5) Pemex Exploración y Producción, Tampico, Mexico
(6) Consultant, The Woodlands, TX
ABSTRACT: Geologic Controls on Neogene Deep-Water and Shelf Gas Plays, Laguna Madre-Tuxpan Continental Shelf, Eastern Mexico
Neogene deltaic, slope-fan, and basin-floor-fan depocenters in the Laguna Madre-Tuxpan
continental shelf were controlled by a variety of structural and physiographic elements
reflecting strike-slip motion, gravity sliding and extension, uplift of source terrains,
and salt evacuation. In a 16-month study of the eastern Mexico continental shelf,
conducted jointly by the Bureau of Economic Geology (BEG) at The University of Texas at
Austin and PEMEX Exploración y Producción, more than 30 plays were defined and mapped
over a 50,000-km2 area linking the Veracruz and southern Burgos Basins.
The south part of the area, structurally continuous with the Veracruz Basin, contains
several deep-seated basement faults that influenced depositional patterns of middle
Miocene deepwater canyons, slope fans, and basin-floor fans that extend for tens of
kilometers into the deep offshore. A major downdip structural trend occurs east of major
listric faults and gravity-sliding systems north of the Veracruz Basin. Long-term,
intermittent growth fault movement provided subsidence and accommodation sufficient to
stabilize Pliocene shelf edges, resulting in hundreds of meters of aggradational, stacked
deltaic and shoreface deposits. The north end of the area, part of the Burgos Basin,
contains intensely deformed strata associated with active and passive diapirism, salt
withdrawal, and salt welds. Upper Miocene and Pliocene plays in this area are mud-rich and
internally complex, including debris-flow and canyon-fill deposits. The upper Pliocene and
lower Pleistocene are dominated by chaotic successions of muddy slump and slope-channel
deposits reflecting massive failure of muddy, unstable slopes.
AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90026©2004 AAPG Annual Meeting, Dallas, Texas, April 18-21, 2004