Organic geochemistry and petroleum geology, tectonics and basin analysis of southern Tarim and northern Qaidam basins, northwest China

Organic geochemistry of oils from the Tarim basin, NW China, distinguish at least seven genetic groups of oils. The largest group are derived from Middle-Upper Ordovician anoxic slope-facies marls coincident with the margins of structural uplifts. Other groups include non-marine derived oils in the Luntai uplift, from southwest Tarim, in the Kuqa depression, and west of the Bachu uplift. A seep sample from west of Kashi clusters with Luntai oils. These results suggest that numerous source-rock horizons occur, but they are really restricted.; Organic geochemistry of oils from northern Qaidam defines a family of hypersaline, anoxic lacustrine derived oils. Cenozoic outcrop samples from northern Qaidam are too organic lean to be of source quality, but dark laminated upper Oligocene mudstones from the Shi 28 well are of fair to good quality. Biomarkers provide a good correlation between the oils and the core samples. Organic matter is from algae and bacteria and lacks terrestrial material. Hydrocarbons are contained in upper Oligocene, Miocene, and Pliocene reservoirs. Eight oils are from NW Qaidam, but one sample comes from NE Qaidam, an area previously believed to only produce oils derived from Jurassic source rocks. Thus an unidentified Cenozoic source rock occurs in NE Qaidam. Thermal modeling indicates generation occurred in northwestern Qaidam within the last 3 million years, agreeing with observed low maturity biomarker parameters.; Cenozoic stratigraphy in northern Qaidam and southern Tarim basins record the tectonic history of the surrounding structural/topographic elements. Paleocurrents record flow away from adjacent ranges from the Miocene to the present. Provenance data tie sediments to adjacent structural elements. Petrography indicates increasingly immature sandstones in Miocene and younger sediments relative to pre-Miocene samples. Apatite fission-track results from southeastern Tarim yield a cooling age of 17 ± 1 Ma indicative of unroofing since at least the Miocene.; Tarim and Qaidam have been separate basins since at least the Oligocene. Differences in organic facies, sandstones, and heavy minerals combined with a previously documented southwardly migrating depocenter and growth structures in most of the Oligocene-present part of the section indicating onset and continuation of thrusting and strike-slip deformation since at least the Oligocene.