Oxfordian Erg Play Fairway Evaluation in the Gulf of Mexico Using 2D and 3D Seismic Evidence

Abstract An aggressive multiclient seismic campaign undertaken as a result of the Mexican oil and gas market opening up to foreign investment in 2014 led to an unprecedented volume of modern, long offset 2D seismic data over the Campeche deepwater basin. Modern processing techniques provided high quality imaging that revealed a large area, greater than 50,000 km2, of Norphlet look-alike structures. Tectonic reconstruction complemented with previous paleoclimatic analyses, indicate that this area was under a very similar depositional environment to the Norphlet erg. These conditions would have extended up to the Ek-Balam aeolian sandstone discovery, resulting in an area of comparable size to the present day Iguidi erg in Algeria.