Browse Basin Hydrocarbon Source Rock and Fluid Analysis

The Browse Basin offshore Australia's North West Shelf is a proven hydrocarbon province. This dataset presents a petroleum systems analysis integrating source rock property maps, basin-specific kinetics, and 3D burial history models to understand fluid sources and phase behavior. The study identifies four Mesozoic petroleum systems, with principal source rocks from the Jurassic to Cretaceous periods.

Use Cases

• Modeling hydrocarbon generation and expulsion based on source rock richness, thickness, and quality maps.
• Analyzing fluid phase behavior and oil rim formation based on integrated petroleum systems analysis.
• Mapping source rock maturity and expelled fluid composition based on 1D burial history and 3D regional surfaces.
• Identifying contributions of land-plant derived organic matter to hydrocarbon systems based on geochemical studies.

Strengths

• Analysis integrates multiple data types: source rock property maps, basin-specific kinetics, and 3D surfaces.
• Identifies four distinct Mesozoic petroleum systems within the basin.
• Specifies principal source rock formations: Plover, Vulcan, Montara, and Echuca Shoals.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Data is provided as a PDF, which may require extraction for computational analysis.

Provenance

Source

Australian Ocean Data Network

Collection Method

Petroleum systems analysis combining geochemical studies of source rocks and fluids with basin modeling.

Time Range

Mesozoic era (focus on Jurassic to Cretaceous periods), with expulsion primarily from Late Cretaceous to present.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-04-16 09:50:08.631086; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Browse Basin, offshore Australia's North West Shelf, including the Caswell Sub-basin.