APPLY POOL-FORMING THRESHOLD THEORY TO EVALUATE PRE-JURASSIC RESOURCE POTENTIAL OF THE TURPAN-HAMI BASIN, NORTHWESTERN CHINA

One of the key tasks of petroleum explorationist is to evaluate resource potential of various petroliferous basins.The Pre-Jurassic Formations in Turpan-Hami basin,located in Xinjiang province in the northwest of China,have been explored for several years,but its quantitative resource potential is still unclear.A new concept for petroleum resource potential assessment that is called hydrocarbon pool-forming threshold has been proposed.It refers to the least hydrocarbon amounts dissipated during the process of pool formation in petroliferous basin.The existence of hydrocarbon pool-forming threshold has been proved by statistical analysis,physical and numerical simulation and geological phenomena.Due to the re-lative magnitude of hydrocarbon generation amount and its potential dissipation amount,different basins have different oil and gas resource potential.Only the basins that had entered the pool-forming threshold have exploration potential.By utilizing the new theory,the oil and gas resources of the Pre-Jurassic formations in Turpan-Hami basin have been calculated to be 3.354×10⁸ tons and 2 652×10⁸ m³ respectively.The proved ratio of oil is only 15%,which indicates the great potential of Turpan-Hami basin for further exploration.