Pre-Stack Imaging for the Messinian Sub Salt Sequences in the Levantine Basin of the East Mediterranean: A Case Study, Offshore Lebanon

The Mediterranean Sea has a progressive geological significance; it is considered a vast extensive promising basin for gas exploration. Herodotus and Levantine basins are the main basins in the eastern Mediterranean basin, which are similar in their evolution stages and accommodate similar sedimentary sequences. The recent geophysical and petrophysical studies proved that Herodotus and Levantine basins are promising for gas with possible great reserves exceeding 2,000 bcm. Recent discoveries and increased exploration activities including seismic acquisition and offshore drilling made the Eastern Mediterranean a hot area for gas exploration, especially after the discovery of Zohr gas Field in 2015, offshore Egypt. However, the regional extension of the complex Messinian salt beds and domes make the exploration of high risk. The subsalt seismic imaging in a time domain and the resolution of the underlying carbonate/clastic reservoirs' primary reflections are a big challenge in this area. Therefore, the main objective of the present study is to improve sub-salt imaging with much more accurate interval velocity estimation. In the study area, offshore Lebanon, the delineated structures in the sub-salt imaging after the Pre-stack Depth Imaging were more significant compared to the Pre-Stack Time Imaging which provided optimum sub-salt imaging and enabled the accurate interpretation of the main geologic features which may increase the certainty level of the hydrocarbon exploration and discoveries.