Module GEOL3031: SEDIMENTARY AND PETROLEUM SYSTEMS

Department: EARTH SCIENCES

GEOL3031: SEDIMENTARY AND PETROLEUM SYSTEMS

Prerequisites

• Petrology of Earth Materials (GEOL2031).

Corequisites

• None.

Excluded Combination of Modules

• None.

Aims

• To introduce students to active research questions and areas of scientific controversy in modern sedimentology.
• To examine the main interacting controls that influence sedimentation in different environmental setting on a global scale.
• To fully appreciate the nature, origin and evolution of sedimentary basin successions from a sedimentary process and economic petroleum basis.

Content

• PART A: Palaeohydraulics.
• Sediment flux - grain to basin scale.
• Carbonates through time.
• Coral reefs.
• Sequence Stratigraphy.
• PART B: General basin studies.
• Subsidence and burial history.
• Thermal history modelling.
• Overpressure.
• Wireline logs.
• Fluid flow.

Learning Outcomes

• On successful completion of this module students will: have built up extensive knowledge of case study examples from around the world based on reading and field experience that will serve as a means for critical evaluation of published models and literature.
• Be confident in the interpretation of past depositional environments from the rock record but realistic as to the limits of the analysis.
• Understand the main controls that influence the accumulation of sediment in any particular environment, know how these controls interact and be able to implement their effects (i.e. sea level, tectonics, sediment supply, climate and 'autocyclic' controls) in a wide variety of geological and geomorphological settings and how these influence the generation and accumulation of petroleum.
• Will have acquired subject knowledge and understanding in Earth's natural resources and the techniques used to locate and exploit them.

• Will have acquired intellectual and practical skills necessary to plan, conduct and report on mix of laboratory and field projects.
• Will have acquired intellectual and practical skills to undertake investigations in a safe and responsible manner with regard to risk assessment, right of access, health and safety regulations and sensitivity to the environment and stakeholders.
• Will have acquired intellectual and practical skills to observe, record accurately and account for geological features in the laboratory and in the field.
• Will have acquired intellectual and practical skills to synthesise information/data from a variety of sources.
• Will have acquired intellectual and practical skills in citation and appropriate use of the literature.

• Prepare, process, interpret and present data using appropriate qualitative and quantitative techniques and packages.
• Recognise and respect the views of other team members.

Modes of Teaching, Learning and Assessment and how these contribute to the learning outcomes of the module

• Lectures, practicals, and seminars will be used to demonstrate processes and examples which are then to be further examined by extra directed reading.
• Practicals and seminars will be assessed through notebooks, project work and data manipulation exercises.
• A common theme through the whole course is extra directed reading and important for a level three module.

Teaching Methods and Learning Hours

Summative Assessment

Formative Assessment:

Practical notebooks, project work, seminar presentation and detailed literature reviews.

■ Attendance at all activities marked with this symbol will be monitored. Students who fail to attend these activities, or to complete the summative or formative assessment specified above, will be subject to the procedures defined in the University's General Regulation V, and may be required to leave the University