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Clay Minerals in Interbedded Sandstones and Shales of the Miocene Surma Group, Sylhet Trough, Bengal Basin (northeastern Indian Plate): Implications for Future Hydrocarbon Exploration

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Clays and Clay Minerals

Abstract

Clay minerals are common constituents of the Miocene Surma Group reservoir rocks in the Sylhet Trough, Bengal Basin, and may exert significant controls on reservoir quality. The relationship between diagenetic clay minerals and reservoir quality in the petroliferous Sylhet Trough is poorly understood, however. The current study was aimed at the origin and diagenetic pattern of clay minerals in interbedded sandstones and shales using thin-section petrography, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and X-ray diffraction (XRD), and understanding their diagenetic effects on reservoir quality. The results showed that the clay mineral cements in sandstones comprise mainly chlorite, illite/illite-smectite, and minor smectite and kaolinite. In the early diagenetic stage, clay rims and growth of vermiform kaolinite occur and partly occlude the pore throats. Deep burial effects include pore-filling, pore-lining, and grain-coating authigenic clays (mainly chlorite and illite). Diagenetic clay minerals and mechanical clay infiltration showed a systematic distribution in sandstones lying in the vicinity of sequence and parasequence boundaries. In a lowstand systems tract (LST), clay minerals within the sandstones commonly include mechanically infiltrated smectitic clays that eventually evolved to grain-coating chlorite and/or illite during the meso-diagenesis stage. The presence of clays/clay minerals has no significant impact upon reservoir quality of sandstones. The Surma Group shales are enriched in illite with significant proportions of chlorite and kaolinite and are likely to be mainly detrital, with diagenetic changes of smectite to illite.

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Data availability

All of the data collected are available in Tables 1 and 2. Core porosity and permeability data (Table 3) are reported from BAPEX, 1996). There are no deposited data.

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Acknowledgments

The authors express their gratitude to the Chairman of Petrobangla and the Managing Director of BAPEX for their kind approval for core analysis and to the Bangladesh Atomic Energy Commission (BAEC), the University of Bonn (Germany), and the University of Liverpool (United Kingdom) for laboratory support. The first author also acknowledges the 'Banggabandhu Fellowship Programme' of the Ministry of Science and Technology of the Government of the People's Republic of Bangladesh for providing the research funding. Special thanks to the Editor-in-Chief, Associate Editor, and anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments and suggestions.

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The first author acknowledges the 'Banggabandhu Fellowship Programme' of the Ministry of Science and Technology of the Government of the People's Republic of Bangladesh for providing the research funding during her PhD.

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  1. Geophysical Division, Bangladesh Petroleum Exploration and Production Company Limited (BAPEX), Dhaka, Bangladesh

    Farida Khanam

  2. Department of Geological Sciences, Jahangirnagar University, Savar, Dhaka, 1342, Bangladesh

    M. Julleh Jalalur Rahman & Rashed Abdullah

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  1. Farida Khanam
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Dr Farida Khanam: Sample collection, data analyses, manuscript writing

Professor M. Julleh Jalalur Rahman: Laboratory work, manuscript writing

Dr Rashed Abdullah: Data analyses, manuscript writing.

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Khanam, F., Rahman, M.J.J. & Abdullah, R. Clay Minerals in Interbedded Sandstones and Shales of the Miocene Surma Group, Sylhet Trough, Bengal Basin (northeastern Indian Plate): Implications for Future Hydrocarbon Exploration. Clays Clay Miner. 70, 328–353 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42860-022-00189-2

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