The Cretaceous Garbutt Formation shale and crude oils from the Cretaceous Chinkeh Formation in Liard Basin were subjected to geochemical analysis including biomarker fingerprinting. The Chinkeh oils are sweet light oils with API gravity and geochemical markers typical for the late stage oil window maturity. The oils show good correlation to the Garbutt shale extracts for their sterane compositions, while there are some minor discrepancies amongst their terpane distributions. These differences include enhanced contribution of tricyclic terpanes, high C₂₃ tricyclic terpanes versus C₃₀ hopane and C₂₄ tetracyclic terpane versus C₂₆ tricyclic terpanes for the Chinkeh oil compared with the Garbutt shale extracts. Although not analyzed during this study, the Triassic Toad/Grayling interval, as stratigraphic equivalents of the Montney and Doig formations in Western Canada Sedimentary Basin may account for the terpane compositional features. Therefore, it is likely that the Chinkeh oils are mainly sourced from the Cretaceous Garbutt shale with minor additional contributions from a Triassic source. The Garbutt Shale is immature in the Horn River Basin, while in the Liard Basin in a north to south transect the unit's thermal maturity ranges from early mature oil window to wet gas/condensate window, and thus may be prospective for unconventional liquid hydrocarbon resource recovery.

对利亚德盆地白垩纪Garbutt组页岩和来自白垩纪Chinkeh组的原油进行了地球化学分析，包括生物标志物指纹识别。Chinkeh油是具有API重力和后期油窗成熟期典型特征的地球化学标志物的甜味轻质油。这些油显示出与Garbutt页岩提取物的甾烷组成有很好的相关性，而它们的萜烯分布之间也存在一些细微的差异。这些差异包括三环萜烯的贡献增加，高C ₂₃三环萜烯相对于C ₃₀ ane烷以及C ₂₄四环萜烯相对于C ₂₆与Garbutt页岩提取物相比，用于Chinkeh油的三环萜烯。尽管在本研究中未进行分析，但三叠纪蟾蜍/灰谷间隔（作为加拿大西部沉积盆地的Montney和Doig地层的地层等效物）可能解释了萜烯的组成特征。因此，Chinkeh油很可能主要来自白垩纪Garbutt页岩，而三叠纪则有少量额外贡献。霍恩河盆地的Garbutt页岩尚不成熟，而北至南横断面的Liard盆地，该单元的热成熟度范围从早期的成熟油窗到湿气/凝析油窗，因此有可能用于非常规的液态烃资源采收。 。