Structural Analysis of Sedimentary Basins

At this stage of the book, all the aspects of imagery interpretation of different structural features have been covered and methods for constraining the analysis with surface and subsurface controls have been illustrated. The next step is to introduce methods to integrate the analysis of the imagery data into a conventional exploration program. Presented here is a systematic approach which begins with the analysis of the entire sedimentary basin and progresses towards the recognition of regional-scale features and their associated hydrocarbon leads. This process often leads to the recognition of new concepts and leads in both frontier and mature areas. As emphasized throughout this book, the analysis is limited to the recognition of geological features that can be constrained with other surface and subsurface exploration tools (seismic, gravity, magnetic, etc.). An additional step in this approach may include the analysis of small-scale linear features that cannot be constrained with subsurface data. This step is not illustrated here for the sake of brevity and the lack of encouraging results experienced by the author in this endeavor.