Università Roma Tre

Introduction and purpose of balanced geological sections. Main techniques used in the past. Fundamentals of deep geological sections. Ramp-fault geometry. Stratigraphic Separation Diagrams. Cutoff Lines (intersections between faults and stratigraphic contacts). Fault Branching. Projection to depth of geological data. Dip domain analysis. Fault-related folding: fault-bend folding; fault-propagation folding. Thick skin versus thin skin tectonics. Restoring a geological section. Angular versus sinuous restoration. Transversal and longitudinal sections. The contribution of fracture patterns in the preparation of a deep section. The role played by compaction and erosion. Section admissibility. Balancing techniques used by commercial software and introduction to their use. The role of fractures in reservoir permeability. Methods to infer fracturing conditions produced by the tectonic evolution of geological structures by the numerical modeling of their tie/space evolution and comparison with analogues.

N.B. Woodward, S.E. Boyer, J. Suppe (1989)- Balanced Geological Cross-Sections: an essential technique in geological research and exploration. - American Geophysical Union. R.C.