South Nicholson Basin

A gravity map showing the completed seismic lines over the South Nicholson Basin region across the Northern Territory and Queensland border.

A major data acquisition program for the Exploring for the Future program has been undertaken in the South Nicholson Basin region.

In early August 2017, Geoscience Australia acquired deep crustal seismic reflection data in the region between the southern McArthur Basin and the Mt Isa western succession, crossing the South Nicholson Basin and Murphy Province. Previously there was no seismic data and minimal well data for the region, which is approximately the size of Tasmania. The collected datawillnow dramatically increase our geological understanding of this highly prospective region.

The objective of this project was to explore exposed and undercover sedimentary basins and structures to better understand the location and scale of potential energy resources. This data will also support mineral exploration through the improved understanding of the region's geological evolution and identification of geological terrains with greater mineral potential. Initial field stack data are of excellent quality and image a variety of previously unknown features.

Outputs

• Tectonic geography of Northern Australia
• Paleoenvironmental reconstruction of the Velkerri Formation
• Oldest known hydrocarbon biomarkers identified in the Wollogorang Formation, northern Australia
• Shale geochemistry as an exploration tool in northern Australia
• Download seismic route: South Nicholson Basin [ZIP 638KB]
• Download the seismic data
• New South Nicholson Basin outline
• Solid Geology Maps over the South Nicholson Basin

New data acquisition

2017 field season:

• Five seismic lines, totalling 1100 line kilometres, with two of the seismic lines to the east linking with existing deep crustal seismic data in the Mt Isa western succession.

Collaboration

The South Nicholson project was undertaken collaboratively with the Northern Territory Geological Survey, the Geological Survey of Queensland and AusScope, providing in-kind and financial contributions.

Data & Publications

• Exploring for the Future – Whole rock geochemistry data release of sedimentary and igneous rocks from the South Nicholson region, Northern Territory and Queensland, Carson, C.J., Jarrett, A.J.M., Anderson, J.R., Champion, D.C., and Henson, P.A. 2020
• Exploring for the Future: South Nicholson Basin Geological summary and seismic data interpretation, Carr, L. Southby, C. Henson, P. Costelloe, R., Anderson, J.R., Jarrett, A.J.M., Carson, C.J., MacFarlane, S., Gorton, J., Hutton, L. Troup, A, Khider, K., Bailey, A., Fomin, T., 2019
• New SHRIMP U-Pb zircon ages from the South Nicholson and Carrara Range regions, Northern Territory, Kositcin, N. and Carson, C.J. 2019.
• New SHRIMP U–Pb zircon ages from the South Nicholson Basin, Mount Isa Province and Georgina Basin, Northern Territory and Queensland, Anderson, J.R., Lewis, C.J., Jarrett, A.J.M., Carr, L.K., Henson, P., Carson, C.J., Southby, C., Munson, T.J. 2019.
• Exploring for the Future: new U–Pb geochronology for the South Nicholson region and implications for stratigraphic correlations, Anderson, J.R., Carson, C.J., Lewis, C.L., Kositcin, N., Cross, A., Carr, L.K., Henson, P. (2019).
• New SHRIMP U-Pb zircon ages from the Birrindudu and Victoria Basins, Northern Territory, Geoscience Australia
• Jarrett, A Thorne, J Schofield, A Bailey, A Champion, D Carson, C Kositcin, N Murr, J Collins, A Subarkah, D Blades, ML Farkas, J Huston, D Henson, P, 2020, Shale geochemistry as an exploration tool in northern Australia: a comparison of the South Nicholson Basin and Lawn Hill Platform to the greater McArthur Basin, Annual Geoscience Exploration Seminar (AGES) Proceedings, Alice Springs, Northern Territory 24-25 March 2020, p. 50 https://geoscience.nt.gov.au/gemis/ntgsjspui/handle/1/90010
• Henson, P, Fomin, T, Costelloe, R, Southby, C Carr, L, 2020, Exploring for the Future: discovering the Barkly region with new regional seismic data, Annual Geoscience Exploration Seminar (AGES) Proceedings, Alice Springs, Northern Territory 24-25 March 2020, p. 50, https://geoscience.nt.gov.au/gemis/ntgsjspui/handle/1/90008
• Carson, C, Kositcin, N Anderson, J, Cross, A Henson, P, 2020, New U-Pb geochronology for the South Nicholson region and implications for stratigraphic correlations, Annual Geoscience Exploration Seminar (AGES) Proceedings, Alice Springs, Northern Territory 24-25 March 2020, p. 44, https://geoscience.nt.gov.au/gemis/ntgsjspui/handle/1/90009

Presentations

AGES 2017-2020:

• Blewett, R, 2017, Exploring for the Future: a new initiative to unlock Northern Australia s minerals, energy and groundwater resources, https://geoscience.nt.gov.au/gemis/ntgsjspui/handle/1/85112
• Henson, P., Carr, L. K., Fomin, T., Gerner, E. Costelloe, R., Southby, C., Anderson, J., Bailey, A., Lewis, C., Champion .D, Huston, D., the Northern Territory Geological Survey & the Queensland Geological Survey. 2018. Exploring for the Future - Discovering the South Nicholson Basin region with new seismic data. In: Annual Geoscience Exploration Seminar (AGES) 2018. Record of abstracts. Northern Territory Geological Survey, Record, pp 52–54 https://geoscience.nt.gov.au/gemis/ntgsjspui/handle/1/87092
• Lidena Carr, Chris Southby, Paul Henson, Chris Carson, Jade Anderson, Susannah MacFarlane, Amber Jarrett, Tanya Fomin and Ross Costelloe, 2019, Exploring for the Future: South Nicholson Basin region project outcomes and sequence stratigraphy, Annual Geoscience Exploration Seminar (AGES) Proceedings, Alice Springs, Northern Territory, 19–20 March 2019. Northern Territory Geological Survey, Darwin. https://geoscience.nt.gov.au/gemis/ntgsjspui/handle/1/88381 eCat - 126947
• Amber Jarrett, Susannah MacFarlane, Tehani Palu, Chris Boreham, Lisa Hall, Dianne Edwards, Grant Cox, Tim J Munson, Jochen Brocks, Lidena Carr and Paul Henson, 2019, Source rock geochemistry and petroleum systems of the greater McArthur Basin and links to other northern Australian Proterozoic basins, Annual Geoscience Exploration Seminar (AGES) Proceedings, Alice Springs, Northern Territory, 19–20 March 2019. Northern Territory Geological Survey, Darwin. https://geoscience.nt.gov.au/gemis/ntgsjspui/handle/1/88381

ASEG 2018

• Anderson, J. R. and Fraser, G. L. 2018. Towards a U-Pb age map for northern Australia. ASEG Extended Abstracts 2018(1), 1-3. https://doi.org/10.1071/ASEG2018abP035, eCat: 115962
• Bailey, A.H.E., Wang, L., Henson, P.A., and Hall, L. (2019) Rock properties and in-situ stress state of the Egilabria prospect, Lawn Hill Platform, Queensland. The APPEA Journal 59, 383-393. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1071/AJ18260, eCat: 126170

APPEA

• Boreham, C.J., Edwards, D.S., Poreda, R.J., Darrah, T.H., Zhu, R., Grosjean, E., Main, P., Waltenberg, K., Henson, P.A., 2018. Helium in the Australian liquefied natural gas economy. The APPEA Journal 58, 209-237. https://doi.org/10.1071/AJ17049
• Bailey A.H.E. and Henson P.A. (2019) Variation of vertical stress in the onshore Canning Basin, Western Australia. The APPEA Journal 59, 264-382 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1071/AJ18259, eCat: 126138

AEGC 2019

• Anderson, J. R., Carson, C. J., Lewis, C. L., Kositcin, N., Cross, A., Carr, L. K., Henson, P. (2019). Exploring for the Future: new U–Pb geochronology for the South Nicholson region and implications for stratigraphic correlations. ASEG Extended Abstracts, 2019(1): 1-5. https://doi.org/10.1080/22020586.2019.12073005, eCat: 126618
• Southby, C., Carr, L. K., Henson, P., Haines, P., Zhan, A., Anderson, J., MacFarlane, S., Formin, T., Costelloe, R. (2019). Exploring for the future: Kidson Sub-basin seismic interpretation. ASEG Extended Abstracts, 2019(1): 1-3. https://doi.org/10.1080/22020586.2019.12073007, eCat: 126282

Related information

• Exploring for the Future delivering results for Northern Australia