f Timing of deposition and assesing the characteristic of potential carbonate oil reservoir along the southeastern circum-caribbean region

Cenozoic coralline and calcareous algae reef carbonates have long been recognized as important oil & gas reservoirs along the Circum-Caribbean Region. Despite their high oil & gas reservoirs potential, timing the deposition of reef carbonate units along this area has remained problematic due to extreme sediment recycling and complex tectonic evolution. Here we use Sr-isotope chemostratigraphy and carbonate U-Pb geochronology to precisely date in-situ corals and calcareous algae facies from several reef carbonate successions along the SE Circum-Caribbean. Detailed stratigraphic, sedimentologic and paragenetic characteristics of the studied sucessions are contrasted against their depositional ages. This allows constraining temporal variations in the structures of the reef carbonate systems along the SE Circum-Caribbean. Predominantly highly porous calcareous algae reef carbonate sucessions characterize the Eocene-Oligocene and the middle Miocene carbonate record in central and eastern Panama and northwestern Colombia. Higly porous coralline reef carbonate fabrics, often mixed with siliciclastic sedimentary facies, characterize, in turn, the late Oligocene, the late Miocene and the Pliocene reef carbonate record from northern Colombia. The stratigraphic, sedimentologic and paragenetic characteristics of the studied successions combined with their depositional ages allow identifying time intervals of carbonate sucessions displaying different oil & gas reservoir potentials. We propose a chronostratigraphic chart with main stratigraphic, sedimentologic and paragenetic (diagenetic) features for the SE Circum-Caribbean carbonate record that can be used as a reference during the search of regionaly occurring reef carbonate oil and gas reservoirs analoges along the Caribbean.