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  • The Neoproterozoic–Paleozoic Officer Basin, located in South Australia and Western Australia, remains a frontier basin for energy exploration with significant uncertainty due to a paucity of data. As part of Geoscience Australia’s Exploring for the Future (EFTF) program, the objective of this study is to derive the petrophysical properties and characterise potential reservoirs in the Neoproterozoic–Cambrian sedimentary succession in the Officer Basin through laboratory testing, and well log interpretation using both conventional and neural network methods. Laboratory measurements of forty-one legacy core samples provide the relationships between gas permeability, Klinkenberg corrected permeability, and nano-scale permeability, as well as grain density, effective and total porosity for various rock types. Conventional log interpretation generates the volume fraction of shale, effective and total porosity from gamma ray and lithology logs. Self-organising map (SOM) was used to cluster the well log data to generate petrophysical group/class index and probability profiles for different classes. Neural network technology was employed to approximate porosity and permeability from logs, conventional interpretation results and class index from SOM modelling. The Neoproterozoic-Cambrian successions have the potential to host both conventional and tight hydrocarbon reservoirs. Neoproterozoic successions are demonstrated to host mainly tight reservoirs with the range in average porosity and geometric mean permeability of 4.77%-6.39% and 0.00087-0.01307 mD, respectively, in the different sequences. The range in average porosity and geometric mean permeability of the potential Cambrian conventional reservoirs is 14.54%-26.38% and 0.341-103.68 mD, respectively. The Neoproterozoic shales have favourable sealing capacities. This work updates the knowledge of rock properties to further the evaluation of the resource potential of the Officer Basin. Published in The APPEA Journal 2022 <b>Citation:</b> Wang Liuqi, Bailey Adam H. E., Carr Lidena K., Edwards Dianne S., Khider Kamal, Anderson Jade, Boreham Christopher J., Southby Chris, Dewhurst David N., Esteban Lionel, Munday Stuart, Henson Paul A. (2022) Petrophysical characterisation of the Neoproterozoic and Cambrian successions in the Officer Basin. <i>The APPEA Journal</i><b> 62</b>, 381-399. https://doi.org/10.1071/AJ21076

  • The Proterozoic succession in the NDI Carrara 1 drill hole, Northern Territory, consists predominantly of tight shales, siltstones, and calcareous clastic rocks. As part of Geoscience Australia’s Exploring for the Future program, this study aims to derive porosity, permeability and gas content from both laboratory testing and well log interpretation from machine learning approaches, to improve the Proterozoic shale gas reservoir characterisation. The Proterozoic Lawn Hill Formation was divided into four chemostratigraphic packages. The middle two packages were further divided into seven internal units according to principal component analysis and self-organising map clustering on well logs and inorganic geochemical properties. Artificial neural networks were then applied to interpret the mineral compositions, porosity and permeability from well logs, density and neutron-density crossplot interpretations. Gas content was estimated from the interpreted porosity, gas saturation, total organic carbon and clay contents. Petrophysical interpretation results are summarised for all chemostratigraphic packages and units. Package 2 (1116–1430.1 m) has the highest potential among the four chemostratigraphic packages. P2U1 (1116–1271 m) and P2U3 (1335.5–1430.1 m) units have the most favourable petrophysical properties for organic-rich shales with the average total gas contents of 1.25 cm3/g and 1.30 cm3/g, geometric mean permeability of 4.79 µD and 17.56 µD, and net shale thickness of 54.4 m and 85.3 m, respectively. P3U4 unit (687.9–697.9 m) has high gas content and permeability, with the net shale thickness of 29.1 m. Besides the organic-rich shales, the tight non-organic-rich siltstone and shale reservoirs in package 1 (below 1430.1 m) have average gas saturation of 14% and geometric mean permeability of 1.31 µD, respectively. Published in The APPEA Journal 2023. <b>Citation:</b> Wang Liuqi, Bailey Adam H. E., Grosjean Emmanuelle, Carson Chris, Carr Lidena K., Butcher Grace, Boreham Christopher J., Dewhurst Dave, Esteban Lionel, Southby Chris, Henson Paul A. (2023) Petrophysical interpretation and reservoir characterisation on Proterozoic shales in National Drilling Initiative Carrara 1, Northern Territory. <i>The APPEA Journal</i><b> 63</b>, 230-246. https://doi.org/10.1071/AJ22049

  • This service provides Australian surface hydrology, including natural and man-made features such as water courses (including directional flow paths), lakes, dams and other water bodies. The information was derived from the Surface Hydrology database, with a nominal scale of 1:250,000. The National Basins and Catchments are a national topographic representation of drainage areas across the landscape. Each basin is made up of a number of catchments depending on the features of the landscape. This service shows the relationship between catchments and basins. The service contains layer scale dependencies.

  • This service provides Australian surface hydrology, including natural and man-made features such as water courses (including directional flow paths), lakes, dams and other water bodies. The information was derived from the Surface Hydrology database, with a nominal scale of 1:250,000. The service contains layer scale dependencies.

  • This service provides Australian surface hydrology, including natural and man-made features such as water courses (including directional flow paths), lakes, dams and other water bodies. The information was derived from the Surface Hydrology database, with a nominal scale of 1:250,000. The service contains layer scale dependencies.

  • This service provides Australian surface hydrology, including natural and man-made features such as water courses (including directional flow paths), lakes, dams and other water bodies. The information was derived from the Surface Hydrology database, with a nominal scale of 1:250,000. The service contains layer scale dependencies.

  • The upper Permian to Lower Triassic sedimentary succession in the southern Bonaparte Basin represents an extensive marginal marine depositional system that hosts several gas accumulations, including the Blacktip gas field that has been in production since 2009. Development of additional identified gas resources has been hampered by reservoir heterogeneity, as highlighted by preliminary results from a post drill analyses of wells in the study area that identify reservoir effectiveness as a key exploration risk. The sedimentary succession that extends across the Permian–Triassic stratigraphic boundary was deposited during a prolonged marine transgression and shows a transition in lithofacies from the carbonate dominated Dombey Formation to the siliciclastic dominated Tern and Penguin formations. Recent improvements in chronostratigraphic calibration of Australian biostratigraphic schemes, spanning the late Permian and Early Triassic, inform our review of available palynological data and re-interpretation and infill sampling of well data. The results provide a better resolved, consistent and up-to-date stratigraphic scheme, allowing an improved understanding of the timing, duration, and distribution of depositional environments of the upper Permian to Lower Triassic sediments across the Petrel Sub-basin and Londonderry High. <b>Citation:</b> Owens R., Kelman A., Khider K., Iwanec J., Bernecker T. (2022) Addressing exploration uncertainties in the southern Bonaparte Basin: enhanced stratigraphic control and post drill analysis for upper Permian plays. <i>The APPEA Journal</i> 62, S474-S479