Evaluation of petroleum generation and expulsion from a source rock by open and restricted system pyrolysis experiments. Part I. extrapolation of experimentally-derived kinetic parameters to natural systems

The kinetic data sets obtained on two different grain-size splits, finely ground (< 0.106 mm) and chip (1-4 mm), of the very same sample show remarkable differences. The geochemical meaning of these differences were investigated by extrapolation of these laboratory-derived kinetic parameters to natural setting by help of a 2-D basin modelling software. The results suggest that modelling's predictions are significantly different, from one kinetic data set to the other, in terms of temperatures and timing of petroleum generation in nature which are very important from the standpoint of petroleum exploration. Application of laboratory-derived kinetic parameters for simulation of petroleum generation from sedimentary organic matter (kerogen) in natural system requires great caution. Conventional use of finely ground (powder) samples in pyrolysis to derive kinetics of petroleum generation is far from representing source rock environments in nature. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.