The Tanimbar islands are situated in the southeasterOn sector of the Banda arccontinent collision zone.

Structurally the Tanimbar area comprises a fold and

thrust belt, consisting of the imbricated outer edge of the Australian continent,
overlain by minor fragments of the pre-collisional oceanic forearc complex. In
terms of both stratigraphy and structural setting, the Tanimbar islands are closely
analogous to the island of Seram in the northern sector of the Banda forearc,
which is the location of several producing oil fields. The Tanimbar islands also lie
immediately north of the recent Abadi commercial gas discovery in INPEXs
Masela PSC block.

Stratigraphy
The Tanimbar islands expose a stratigraphic succession ranging in age from
Permian to Recent. The Permian-Early Cretaceous succession was deposited
within, and on the western flank of, a large graben basin, the northward
continuation of the Calder Graben on the Australian continental margin .The midCretaceous to Miocene succession is a deepwater sequence that accumulated on
the Australian margin after continental breakup.

Hydrocarbon Potential
The hydrocarbon prospectivity of the Tanimbar islands is treated in greater detail
in an oil industry consultancy study . Source rocks are interpreted particularly
within the Late Triassic-Early Jurassic succession, based on close stratigraphic
similarity with proven source rocks of this age in Seram and Timor. Potential

reservoir sandstones occur at several levels in the Tanimbar stratigraphy, but

particularly in a fluviodeltaic succession of Late Triassic-Early Jurassic age (the
Maru Formation). This is contemporaneous with the inferred source rocks, and is
directly analogous to the Kanikeh Formation of Seram, which forms the reservoir
sequence in the Bula Tenggara and Belien oil fields. The Maru Formation also
forms part of the same Plover fluviodeltaic system that reservoirs (in slightly
younger sequences) the Sunrise, Troubadour and Abadi gas fields on the
Australian Northwest Shelf, to the south and southwest of Tanimbar. The Maru
Formation is succeeded by Middle Jurassic transgressive shales, which are
interpreted as forming a regional seal.
The most likely trap type in the Tanimbar area is inversion anticlines, formed by
reactivation in compression of pre-collisional graben structures .Listric normal
faults on the eastern (lower-plate) margin of the pre-collisional Calder graben
system are interpreted as having been reactivated in compression to form
inversion anticlines beneath the complex surficial fold and thrust/mlange belt.
Based on surface geology, gravity data and offshore seismic, these inversion
anticlines are likely to be similar in size to, or larger than, the inversion anticline
hosting the Oseil oilfield in Seram.

Figure 5. Seismic Section 4, composite seismic sections showing the tectonic units
in the south of Tanimbar Trough such as the Banda Arc accretionary wedge,
Tanimbar trough, northeastern Abadi High and the Calder Graben (after Carter
et al, 2003)..