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To: spycatcher
I wish I could weigh in these reports about the basement rocks being productive in central asia. I never have read anything about the geology of that region.

It's counterintuitive, though. Basement rocks here in North America are pre-Cambrian granite. It not only couldn't serve as a source rock, but it has no porosity or permeability. In lay terms, no oil could flow through the rock if it wanted to. It would make an excellent seal.

The only way it could produce is through heavy fracturing and with a source below it. We see that all the time in the overthrust belt of the Rocky Mountains. But there, the "basement rocks" aren't really basement. They have been overthrust onto younger rocks which are providing the actual source of the hydrocarbons.

Whether that's what is happening in central asia, I simply couldn't say.

149 posted on 11/20/2001 2:11:39 PM PST by Dog Gone
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To: Dog Gone
Good info about U.S. geology
156 posted on 11/20/2001 2:50:48 PM PST by spycatcher
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