Dukhan Field is a large

petroleum Petroleum, also known as crude oil or simply oil, is a naturally occurring, yellowish-black liquid chemical mixture found in geological formations, consisting mainly of hydrocarbons. The term ''petroleum'' refers both to naturally occurring un ...

-producing field extending over an area of approximately 80 km in

Dukhan Dukhan () is a city in the western municipality of Al-Shahaniya, Qatar. It is approximately west of the capital, Doha. Dukhan is administered by Qatar's state oil agency QatarEnergy and is the site of the first oil discovery in Qatar. It was pr ...

Qatar Qatar, officially the State of Qatar, is a country in West Asia. It occupies the Geography of Qatar, Qatar Peninsula on the northeastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula in the Middle East; it shares Qatar–Saudi Arabia border, its sole land b ...

. The first well was drilled in 1939/1940 and the first export of petroleum from Dukhan went out in 1949. The field produces up to of crude oil per day.

Overview

The onshore Dukhan field, located along the west coast of the peninsula, is the country's largest producing oil field. The field is roughly long and between to wide. It contains four reservoirs: Khatiyah, Fahahil and Jaleha/Diyab, three are oil reservoirs, and one contains non-associated gas. Oil and gas are separated in four degassing stations: Khatiyah North, Khatiyah Main, Fahahil Main and Jaleha. Stabilized crude is transported by pipeline to the Mesaieed port.

History

Exploratory drilling was initiated in 1938 on the Dukhan anticline and, in 1939, the initial

oil well An oil well is a drillhole boring in Earth that is designed to bring petroleum oil hydrocarbons to the surface. Usually some natural gas is released as associated petroleum gas along with the oil. A well that is designed to produce only gas m ...

was struck in the Number 3 Limestone of the Qatar Formation. Operations were put on hold temporarily in 1942 due to the Second World War but were resumed in 1947. In 1949, oil was discovered in two reservoirs of the

Upper Jurassic The Late Jurassic is the third epoch of the Jurassic Period, and it spans the geologic time from 161.5 ± 1.0 to 143.1 ± 0.8 million years ago (Ma), which is preserved in Upper Jurassic strata.Owen 1987. In European lithostratigraphy, the name ...

Arab Formation known as Arab C and Arab D. On 28 March 1953, a massive fire erupted at well DK35, which was drilling the Arab-D reservoir.

Geology

The Dukhan Field is situated on the Dukhan

anticline In structural geology, an anticline is a type of Fold (geology), fold that is an arch-like shape and has its oldest Bed (geology), beds at its core, whereas a syncline is the inverse of an anticline. A typical anticline is convex curve, c ...

, a group of folds which runs in a NNW to SSE direction parallel with the western coast. The Dukhan anticline, with its thin lengthened structure and moderately steep dips stands out from the greater part of the neighboring folds. This has prompted some geologists to associate its formation with deep-seated salt movement. The overall length of the anticline is roughly 80 km above the lowest closing contour. Jebel Nakhsh lies at the southern boundary of the anticline. The Dukhan anticline demonstrates a range in the extremity of folding along its length; the folding of the northern part being more pronounced than the southern. Intricate mapping of the anticline was carried out in 1948–49.

References

Foreign ministry of Qatar's description of Dukhan Field
* The Qatar Oil Discoveries, Rasoul Sorkhabi, Ph.D., in GEO ExPro Magazine, Vol. 7, No. 1 - 2010 http://www.geoexpro.com/articles/2010/01/the-qatar-oil-discoveries Oil fields of Qatar {{coord, 25.4485, N, 50.7874, E, source:wikidata, display=title