96 Twenty-Seven Years of Advances in Understanding Salt-Sediment Interaction: A Legacy of Katherine A. Giles

This session seeks contributions that highlight the interconnections between coevolving salt bodies and depositional systems in continental, shallow marine and deep marine settings. Field, geobiological, geophysical, and geochemical, as well as theoretical, physical and numerical modeling studies are encouraged.

Monday, 20 October 2025
8:00 AM - 12:00 PM
HBGCC, 303AB

Prediction of Sediment Distribution and Stratigraphic Traps along Salt Structures

Paper number: 96-4
Program: Technical Sessions
Time: 9:05 AM – 9:25 AM

Authors

Abstract

Sediment distribution and stratigraphic traps in salt-controlled minibasins are important targets for the hydrocarbon industry and gas storage projects. However, predicting sediment dispersal patterns along salt structures remains a significant challenge. In addition to classic controlling factors for sediment supply and distribution (eustasy, tectonics, climate) the interplay with growing salt structures adds another level of complexity. Drastic spatial facies change very often occur at small distances (<250m), especially near the salt structure. Based on a compilation of relevant outcrop analogs of salt-controlled sedimentary successions, the relation between the sediment distribution pattern and diagnostic halokinetic geometries is presented in this talk. A new model is proposed with improved prediction capacity of sediment distribution and stratigraphic trap occurrence using diagnostic halokinetic geometries.

Halokinetic geometries result from horizontal to gently dipping depositional surfaces formed by the differential evacuation/inflation of an underlaying salt layer. These geometries exhibit diverse shape across varying scales. The most extensive halokinetic geometry examined herein is the recently defined Minibasin Tectonostratigraphic Unit (MTS) by Rowan & Giles, 2023, which comprises sedimentary strata extending over many kilometers and with thicknesses of hundreds to thousands of meters. Such multiple-km scale halokinetic geometries are clearly imaged by seismic and can be used as a tool to predict facies distribution. In order to characterize in detail reservoir facies distribution inside MTS, we have compiled and synthetized sedimentological and stratigraphical data from world-class outcrop analogs (i.e. Sivas basin, Turkey; the Paradox basin, United States; the southern Pyrenees, Spain; La Popa basin, Mexico). This study highlights remarkable tendencies that enable us to link specific halokinetic geometry types with a typical sediment distribution. This study is the initial step in creating a generic model to interpret seismic data of halokinetic geometries in undrilled areas.

Geological Society of America Abstracts with Programs. Vol. 57, No. 6

doi: 10.1130/abs/2025AM-412064

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