Understanding Heat Flow and Implications for Hydrocarbon Exploration in the Northern Red Sea through Scenario Testing

The northern Red Sea is an under-explored basin with potential working petroleum systems. The Gulf of Suez, immediately to the north, has a prolific hydrocarbon system, and is in many ways analogous, with a key distinction that has many implications for petroleum systems: the Gulf of Suez is a failed rift since the Miocene, whereas the Red Sea has continued rifting to the present day. Heat flow probes in the northern Red Sea indicate anomalously high surface heat flow in the deep basin, even for active rifting. We present 2-dimensional crustal models of the northern Red Sea and then explore several scenarios that might explain the elevated heat flow measurements, including depth-dependent stretching, rift acceleration, strain localization, hydrothermal convection, and salt structures penetrating to shallow depths. Next, we examine two viable crustal heat flow scenarios in a conceptualized 2-dimensional basin model. A hot scenario represents elevated crustal heat flow values, consistent with surface probe measurements, and a cooler scenario represents crustal heat flow only modestly elevated relative to simplified rift models. Results indicate greater charge timing risk in the hot case, whereas the cooler scenario is more prospective.