Plio-Pleistocene strata of offshore Texas having hydrocarbon exploration potential are restricted to the southeastern continental shelf and upper continental slope. This thick wedge of nearshore and deep-marine sediments firms the west margin of a late Neogene and Quaternary depocenter. The wedge is divided into eight genetic sequences on the basis of well logs, paleontological reports, and seismic profiles.
The Sabine Arch is a large (1 2,000 mi2 [31,000 km2]), low-amplitude anticline centered on the Texas-Louisiana border. A basement-cored feature that formed in the Jurassic, the arch has been interpreted as (1) a Jurassic horst that persisted throughout the Cretaceous as a topographic relict of rifting, (2) a dome caused by deep-seated Cretaceous plutonism, and (3) a fold caused by regional tectonism. Using regional maps and cross sections derived from approximately 800 well logs, we outlined the depositional history of the arch region, thus documenting arch movement history.
The Upper Devonian Woodford Formation is an organic-rich petroleum source rock that extends throughout West Texas and southeastern New Mexico and currently is generating oil or gas in the subsurface. The Woodford is a potential hydrocarbon reservoir in areas where it is highly fractured; the most favorable drilling targets are fractured siltstone or chert beds in densely faulted regions such as the Central Basin Platform, southernmost Midland Basin, and parts of the Northwestern Shelf.
In response to a need for a concise presentation of new terms and concepts in salt tectonics, we have compiled a glossary that focuses on ideas developed during the 1980's. Unlike conventional glossaries, ours is conceptual rather than alphabetical; each term is defined in the context of preceding terms. When known, the first paper to define or develop a new term has been cited. The purpose of this glossary is to promote a common language for salt tectonics, so that terminology and concepts will be better understood and so that the discipline will continue to develop.