1. science
2. geology
3. seismology
4. earthquakes

Hydrocarbon basins in SE Asia: understanding why they are there
Robert Hall
SE Asia Research Group, Department of Earth Sciences, Royal Holloway University of London, Egham,
Surrey TW20 0EX, UK
(e-mail: [email protected])
ABSTRACT: There are numerous hydrocarbon-rich sedimentary basins in Indonesia, Malaysia and southern Thailand. Almost all these basins began to form in the
Early Cenozoic, they are filled with Cenozoic sediments, most are rifted basins that
are the product of regional extension, and they formed mainly on continental crust.
Many different models have been proposed to account for their formation and age.
Understanding basin development requires a better knowledge of the Mesozoic and
Early Cenozoic history of Sundaland, which mainly lacks rocks of this age.
Sundaland is a heterogeneous region, assembled from different continental blocks
separated by oceanic sutures, in which there has been significant Mesozoic and
Cenozoic deformation. It is not a ‘shield’ or ‘craton’. Beneath Sundaland there is a
marked difference between the deep mantle structure west and east of about 100E
reflecting different Mesozoic and Cenozoic subduction histories. To the west are
several linear high velocity seismic anomalies interpreted as subducted Tethyan
oceans, whereas to the east is a broad elliptical anomaly beneath SE Asia indicating
a completely different history of subduction. Throughout most of the Cretaceous
there was subduction north of India, preceding collision with Asia. However, north
of Australia the situation was different. Cretaceous collisions contributed to
elevation of much of Sundaland. Subduction beneath Sundaland ceased in the
Cretaceous after collision of Gondwana continental fragments and, during the Late
Mesozoic and Paleocene, there was a passive margin surrounding most of Sundaland. When Australia began to move northwards from about 45 Ma, subduction
resumed at the Sunda Trench. Basins began to form as the region went into
compression at the time of subduction initiation. There was widespread extension,
broadly orthogonal to the maximum compressive stress but modified by pre-existing
basement structure. After subduction resumed, the weakness of the Sundaland
lithosphere, unusually responsive to changing forces at the plate edges, meant that
the basins record a complex tectonic history.
KEYWORDS: sedimentary basins, Sundaland, subduction
INTRODUCTION
There are numerous hydrocarbon-rich sedimentary basins in
and around the Sunda Shelf in Indonesia, Malaysia and southern Thailand, in the continental area described as Sundaland
(Fig. 1). Almost all of these basins began to form in the Early
Cenozoic, many are very deep and they are typically filled with
terrestrial and shallow-marine sediments. The basins formed on
continental crust, although this crust has a complex character,
in terms of fabric and lithologies, and probably differs considerably from older major continents. From a tectonic point of
view the basins present two particular problems: exactly when
did they begin to form and why? The two questions cannot be
separated and it is not possible to identify a mechanism without
knowing the timing. The abundance of basins suggests a major
driving force should be identifiable. There are several large
tectonic causes that have been proposed or are feasible,
including effects of India–Asia collision, collisions at the SE
Asian margins, regional extension due to subduction-related
Petroleum Geoscience, Vol. 15 2009, pp. 131–146
DOI 10.1144/1354-079309-830
processes, such as hinge rollback, or plate boundary changes
following events elsewhere in the global plate system.
In this paper it is proposed that most of the basins began to
form broadly synchronously in the Middle Eocene. It is argued
that they formed in response to breaking of the plate of which
Sundaland was part when new subduction systems were initiated around Sundaland. The considerable variation in the
geometry, character and distribution of the basins, and their
subsequent histories, reflect two important features of Sundaland: the composite character of its basement and the weakness
of its lithosphere.
BASIN FORMATION MODELS
A great deal has been written on the basins of the Sundaland
region and a large number of models have been proposed to
account for the formation of some or all of the sedimentary
basins. It is not the intention of this paper to discuss the
1354-0793/09/$15.00 2009 EAGE/Geological Society of London
132
R. Hall
Fig. 1. Geography of SE Asia and
surrounding regions. Small black filled
triangles are volcanoes from the
Smithsonian Institution, Global
Volcanism Program (Siebert & Simkin
2002), and bathymetry is simplified
from the GEBCO (2003) digital atlas.
Bathymetric contours are at 200 m,
3000 m and 5000 m.
distribution and details of different basins, or basin models, and
the reader is referred to reviews or special volumes (e.g.
Williams et al. 1995; Howes & Noble 1997; Longley 1997;
Petronas 1999; Hall & Morley 2004; Doust & Sumner 2007)
and papers cited below for this information.
The basins have been classified in different ways and
assigned to different categories. Many have been suggested to
have originated as pull-apart basins due to strike-slip faulting
(e.g. Davies 1984; Tapponnier et al. 1986; Polachan et al. 1991;
Huchon et al. 1994; Cole & Crittenden 1997; Shaw 1997;
Leloup et al. 2001). A few have been suggested to have a
flexural origin (e.g. DeCelles & Giles 1996; Wheeler & White
2002). Most authors have suggested that all or most basins are
rifts (e.g. Burri 1989; Williams & Eubank 1995; Longley 1997;
Wheeler & White 2002; Hall & Morley 2004; Doust & Sumner
2007).
A variety of mechanisms have been suggested to account for
basin formation. Many authors link basin formation to India–
Asia collision, either related to extrusion-related strike-slip
faulting (e.g. Huchon et al. 1994; Madon & Watts 1998; Leloup
et al. 2001; Tapponnier et al. 1986) or by driving extension (e.g.
Cole & Crittenden 1997; Longley 1997). Many other authors
have explicitly or implicitly linked basin formation to subduction. Some of the basins are described as forearc basins (e.g.
Madon 1999), and many have been described as back-arc basins
(e.g. Eubank & Makki 1981; Busby & Ingersoll 1995; Cole &
Crittenden 1997; Barber et al. 2005), although it is not always
clear if this term is being applied in a purely descriptive sense,
referring to their present setting, or a mechanistic sense, to
indicate they formed behind an active arc. Morley (2001)
suggested extension driven by subduction rollback to account
for the formation of some Sundaland basins and Moulds (1989)
proposed subduction-driven compression could account for
extension of Sumatran and possibly other basins. Many authors
have noted the importance of pre-existing basement structures
in influencing basin development (e.g. Hamilton 1979; Moulds
1989; Hutchison 1996a; Madon 1999; Hall & Morley 2004;
Sapiie & Hadiana 2007).
One of the problems in interpreting the causes of basin
formation is identifying the ages of basin initiation. Dating the
initiation of basin formation is problematical because the oldest
parts of the sequences are terrestrial, typically lack fossils and, in
many cases, are observed only on seismic data. The older parts
of many basins have not been sampled because they are too
deep. It is possible that there is a progressive change in the age
of basin formation from the external parts of Sundaland, with
basin initiation becoming younger towards the interior, but it
appears more likely that subsidence began at approximately the
same time across most of Sundaland (Longley 1997; Hall &
Morley 2004; Doust & Sumner 2007). More work is certainly
needed to try to date basin initiation more accurately, but the
problems in doing this will not be overcome easily and ages will
remain uncertain, because Upper Cretaceous and Paleocene
sedimentary rocks are missing from most of Sundaland, probably reflecting widespread uplift and subsequent erosion after
the mid-Cretaceous. It is reasonably certain that rifting began
almost everywhere except in Thailand in the Eocene, and the
oldest proven rift sequences are Middle Eocene. Therefore, the
best estimate for basin initiation is suggested here to be about
45 Ma. The ideas proposed below are not critically dependent
on this proposed age or the synchronicity of basin formation.
SUNDALAND LITHOSPHERE
The interior of SE Asia, particularly the Sunda Shelf (Fig. 1)
and surrounding emergent, but topographically relatively low
areas of Sumatra, the Thai-Malay peninsula and Borneo are
largely free of seismicity and volcanism, in marked contrast to
its margins. This tectonically quiet region forms the continental
core of Sundaland (Hall & Morley 2004). Sundaland extends
north into Indochina, much of it was terrestrial for most of the
Cenozoic and it formed an exposed landmass during the
Pleistocene. Most of the shelf is flat, extremely shallow, with
water depths considerably less than 200 m. Seismicity (Cardwell
& Isacks 1978; Engdahl et al. 1998) and GPS measurements
(Rangin et al. 1999; Michel et al. 2001; Bock et al. 2003; Simons
Hydrocarbon basins in SE Asia
et al. 2007) indicate that a SE Asian or Sunda microplate is
currently moving slowly relative to the Eurasian Plate. The
Sunda Shelf is widely regarded as a stable area (e.g. Geyh et al.
1979; Tjia 1992; Hanebuth et al. 2000) and sea-level data from
the region have been used in construction of global eustatic
sea-level curves (e.g. Fleming et al. 1998; Bird et al. 2007),
despite evidence of very young faulting and vertical movements
(e.g. Bird et al. 2006).
The present stability and the extensive shallow area of the
Sunda Shelf has led to a widespread misconception that
Sundaland was a stable area during the Cenozoic. It is often
described as a shield or craton (e.g. Ben-Avraham & Emery
1973; Gobbett & Hutchison 1973; Tjia 1996; Parkinson et al.
1998; Barber et al. 2005), or plate (e.g. Davies 1984; Cole &
Crittenden 1997; Replumaz & Tapponnier 2003; Replumaz et al.
2004), implying a rigid block with deformation concentrated
at the edges during the Cenozoic. Some authors suggest
Sundaland rotated clockwise as a block during the last
8–10 million years (e.g. Rangin et al. 1999) or over a longer
period (Replumaz et al. 2004).
However, the character of the Sundaland deep crust and
mantle is quite different from nearby continental regions and
from cratons (Hall & Morley 2004; Hyndman et al. 2005; Currie
& Hyndman 2006). Unlike the well-known shields or cratons
(e.g. Baltic, Canadian, African, Australian), Sundaland is not
underlain by a thick cold lithosphere that was stabilized in the
Precambrian. There has been significant deformation during
the Cenozoic with formation of the sedimentary basins, as well
as localized inversion and widespread elevation of mountains.
There are numerous faults that have been active during the
Cenozoic (e.g. Pubellier et al. 2005; Doust & Sumner 2007).
The Sundaland interior has high surface heat flow values,
typically greater than 80 mW m2. Doust & Sumner (2007)
noted exceptionally elevated heat flow (>150 mW m2 ) and
temperature gradients in the area that extends from the Central
Sumatra Basin northward into the southern Gulf of Thailand
with an unknown cause. At the Indonesian margins high heat
flows reflect subduction-related magmatism but the hot interior
of Sundaland mainly reflects upper crustal heat flow from
radiogenic granites and their erosional products, the insulation
effects of sediments and a large mantle contribution (Hall &
Morley 2004). Locally very high heat flows may reflect fluid
movements in the upper crust. P- and S-wave seismic tomography (Bijwaard et al. 1998; Ritsema & van Heijst 2000) also show
the region is characterized by low velocities in the lithosphere
and underlying asthenosphere, in marked contrast to Indian
and Australian continental lithosphere to the NW and SE. Such
low mantle velocities are commonly interpreted in terms of
elevated temperature, and this is consistent with regional
high heat flow, but they may also partly reflect the mantle
composition or elevated volatile contents.
Sundaland has been very far from stable (Hall & Morley
2004) and it did not behave as a single rigid block during most
of the Cenozoic. The considerable evidence for a heterogeneous pattern of subsidence and elevation indicates significant internal deformation (Hall 1996, 2002; Hall et al. 2008).
The upper mantle velocities and heat flow observations suggest
the region is underlain by a thin and weak lithosphere (Hall &
Morley 2004; Hyndman et al. 2005) that extends many hundreds
of kilometres from the volcanic margins. Of critical importance
is the observation that such extensive regions of thin and hot
lithosphere are weak (Hyndman et al. 2005; Currie & Hyndman
2006) and have a total strength of similar magnitude to forces
acting at plate boundaries. When dry, plate boundary forces
may exceed the total lithosphere strength during compression
and, when wet, during both compression and extension. As
133
Fig. 2. Sundaland at the end of the Cretaceous, modified after
Metcalfe (1996), Barber et al. (2005) and Barber & Crow (2009).
West Sumatra, West Burma and Indochina–East Malaya formed part
of a Cathaysia block added to Eurasia during the Palaeozoic.
Sibumasu was accreted along the Raub–Bentong suture in the
Triassic. West Burma and West Sumatra were subsequently moved
along the Sundaland margin. The Woyla Arc was accreted in the
Cretaceous. The Luconia block is interpreted here to be a Cathaysian
fragment rifted from Asia and added to Sundaland during the
Mesozoic. SW Borneo (Metcalfe 1990) and East Java–West Sulawesi
(Smyth et al. 2007) are interpreted to have been rifted from West
Australia and added in the Late Cretaceous.
suggested elsewhere (Hall 2002; Hall & Morley 2004), this
means the entire region is likely to be unusually responsive to
changing plate boundary forces. This weakness has been of
major importance in the initiation of the Sundaland sedimentary basins, and in their later histories.
SUNDALAND HISTORY BEFORE THE EOCENE
The continental core of Sundaland was assembled from fragments (Fig. 2) that rifted from Gondwana during formation of
different Tethyan oceans and this history is well described by
Metcalfe (e.g. 1996, 1998). An Indochina–East Malaya block
separated from Gondwana in the Devonian and, by the
Carboniferous, was at tropical low latitudes where a distinctive
Cathaysian flora developed. In contrast, Sibumasu separated
from Gondwana in the Permian, and collided with Indochina–
East Malaya, already amalgamated with the South and North
China blocks, in the Triassic. Permian and Triassic granites of
the Thai–Malay Tin Belt are the products of subduction and
post-collisional magmatism (Hutchison 1989).
The Mesozoic sedimentary record is very limited but suggests that much of Sundaland was emergent. Barber et al. (2005)
suggested a complex shuffling of Cathaysian and Gondwana
blocks during the Late Palaeozoic and Early Mesozoic, possibly
associated with important strike-slip faulting. During the Mesozoic there were several episodes of granite magmatism, interpreted to have occurred at an Andean-type margin related to
northward subduction, during the Jurassic and Cretaceous
(McCourt et al. 1996). More continental fragments were added
to Sundaland in the Cretaceous (Fig. 3). The Kuching Zone
(Hutchison 2005) includes rocks with Cathaysian affinities
suggesting an Asian origin and a subduction margin continuing
south from East Asia at which ophiolitic, island arc and
microcontinental crustal fragments were added during the
Mesozoic.
Several important blocks were added in the Cretaceous. SW
Borneo is interpreted here to be a continental block rifted from
134
R. Hall
Fig. 3. Inferred position of the Late Jurassic and the Early
Cretaceous Sundaland margin, adapted in part from Hamilton
(1979), Parkinson et al. (1998) and Smyth et al. (2007). A suture
between pre-Cretaceous Sundaland and the SW Borneo block is
assumed to be present beneath the Sunda Shelf. Its position is
uncertain. The extent and boundaries of the Cathaysian Luconia
block are also uncertain. The youngest Cretaceous suture runs from
Java and through the Meratus Mountains of SE Borneo and to the
south and east of this is a continental fragment derived from western
Australia (Smyth et al. 2007).
the West Australian margin, and added to Sundaland in the
Early Cretaceous. The suture is suggested to run south from the
Natuna area along the structural lineament named the Billiton
Depression (Ben-Avraham 1973; Ben-Avraham & Emery
1973) and originally interpreted by Ben-Avraham & Uyeda
(1973) as a transform fault associated with Cretaceous opening
of the South China Sea. After collision of the SW Borneo block
the Cretaceous active margin ran from Sumatra into West Java
and continued northeast through SE Borneo into West
Sulawesi. The intra-oceanic Woyla Arc collided with the Sumatran margin in the mid-Cretaceous, adding arc and ophiolitic
rocks to the southern margin of Sumatra (Barber et al. 2005).
Further east the Early Cretaceous active margin is marked by
Cretaceous high pressure–low temperature subduction-related
metamorphic rocks in Central Java, the Meratus Mountains of
SE Borneo and West Sulawesi (Parkinson et al. 1998). Further
fragments were added to Sundaland during the Late Cretaceous
(Fig. 3) in East Java and West Sulawesi (Smyth et al. 2007;
van Leeuwen et al. 2007).
Until recently, most authors (e.g. Metcalfe 1996) accepted
that fragments rifted from the west Australian margin in the
Late Jurassic and Early Cretaceous had collided in West Burma
in the Cretaceous, or were uncertain about their present
position. However, recent work suggests West Burma is not a
block added in the Cretaceous, but has been part of SE Asia
since the Early Mesozoic, possibly linked to West Sumatra
(Barber & Crow 2009). The west Australian fragments are now
in Borneo, East Java and West Sulawesi. Outboard of the
Meratus suture, East Java and West Sulawesi are underlain in
part by Archaean continental crust, and geochemistry (Elburg
et al. 2003) and zircon dating (Smyth et al. 2007; van Leeuwen
et al. 2007) indicate a west Australian origin.
The Cretaceous arrival of continental fragments contributed
to crustal thickening, magmatism (see below), emergence and
widespread erosion of Sundaland during the Late Cretaceous
and Early Cenozoic, thus further diminishing the completeness
of the stratigraphic record. Of greater importance for basin
development was the considerable variation in basement
Fig. 4. Depth slice at 300 km from the P-wave tomographic model
of Bijwaard & Spakman (2000). High velocities are represented by
blue and low velocities by red. The slice shows high velocity
anomalies parallel to present trenches, interpreted as subducted slabs
around Indonesia, and relatively low velocities beneath Sundaland.
lithologies and structure, which gave Sundaland at the beginning of the Cenozoic a highly complex basement fabric that
varies from area to area, and which includes profound and deep
structural features that have been reactivated at different times
in different ways. This complex basement structure is the
second important influence on the formation and character of
the sedimentary basins of Sundaland.
MANTLE STRUCTURE BENEATH SUNDALAND
P-wave and S-wave seismic tomography not only indicate the
likely strength of the lithosphere but also display the mantle
structure beneath Sundaland (Widiyantoro & van der Hilst
1997; Bijwaard et al. 1998; Ritsema & van Heijst 2000) from
which important insights into the subduction history of the
region can be obtained. Tomographic depth slices of the upper
mantle (Fig. 4) reveal very clear, broadly curvilinear high
velocity anomalies, mainly parallel to present trenches, interpreted as the principal lithospheric slabs subducted during the
Late Cenozoic. However, of greater importance for interpreting
the older history are velocity contrasts in the lower mantle. At
depths below 700 km there is a marked difference between the
mantle structure west and east of about 100E (Fig. 5). To the
west there are a series of linear high velocity anomalies trending
roughly NW–SE, interpreted as subducted remnants of
Tethyan oceans by van der Voo et al. (1999). East of 100E
these anomalies no longer exist, and only the southernmost
anomaly can be traced eastwards. To the west of 100E is a
clear linear NW–SE-orientated high velocity anomaly, but to
the east the apparent continuation of the anomaly beneath SE
Asia has a quite different appearance. It has a broad elliptical
shape with a long axis orientated approximately NE–SW
that terminates at the edge of the west Pacific beneath the
Philippines.
North of India the linear anomalies have been interpreted as
a series of subduction zones active during India’s northward
movement before collision with Asia (van der Voo et al. 1999;
Aitchison et al. 2007). The high velocity anomaly in the lower
mantle beneath Indonesia represents the accumulation of
subducted lithosphere, but indicates a completely different
subduction history. Replumaz et al. (2004) have suggested that
the lower mantle tomography reflects a large clockwise rotation
Hydrocarbon basins in SE Asia
135
Cretaceous and Paleocene, except in West Sulawesi and Sumba.
However, there was widespread granite magmatism across most
of southern Sundaland in the Cretaceous, which unlike products of older episodes (e.g. Hutchison 1989; Krähenbuhl 1991;
Cobbing et al. 1992; McCourt et al. 1996) is not arranged in
linear belts, and suggests crustal melting across a large region
during a long period, rather than subduction-related plutonism.
Fig. 5. Depth slice at 1100 km from the P-wave tomographic model
of Bijwaard & Spakman (2000). The slice shows the linear high
velocity anomalies beneath India, in contrast to the deep wide high
velocity anomaly beneath Sundaland. The line at about 100E is
interpreted to be the eastern end of the subduction zones north of
India.
of a single SE Asian block since 40 Ma, as proposed in a
reconstruction of the India–Asia collision zone by Replumaz &
Tapponnier (2003). However, there is no evidence from
palaeomagnetism (Fuller et al. 1999) for the rotation or latitude
change suggested by Replumaz & Tapponnier (2003) and the
area of the anomaly extends significantly south of their reconstructed position of the Java Trench. The geological history of
the region is also much more complex than that expected by
rotation of a single rigid SE Asian plate (Hall et al. 2008).
The reconstruction of Hall (2002) offers an alternative
interpretation of the deep anomaly beneath SE Asia. Both the
upper and lower mantle reveal the importance of long-term
subduction at the Indonesian margins. However, most of what
is observed in the mantle records the northward movement of
Australia during the Cenozoic, which began to move at a
significant rate only from about 45 Ma (Royer & Sandwell
1989). There is no evidence for a similar series of Tethyan
oceans to those subducted north of India, consistent with
the absence of subduction during the Late Cretaceous and
Paleocene. The position of the deep lower mantle anomaly fits
well with that expected from Indian–Australian lithosphere
subducted northward at the Java margin since about 45 Ma, and
proto-South China Sea lithosphere subducted southward at the
north Borneo trench since 45 Ma, with contributions from
several other subduction zones within east Indonesia, such as
those associated with the Sulu Arc, and the Sangihe Arc. The
difference in subduction history north of India compared to
that north of Australia, with the change occurring at about
100E, is the third major feature relevant to the formation of
the sedimentary basins of Sundaland.
IGNEOUS ACTIVITY FROM THE LATE
CRETACEOUS TO EOCENE
Typically, plate tectonic reconstructions have assumed subduction was underway at the Sunda Trench at least by the Early
Eocene (e.g. Hall 1996, 2002) or from the Late Cretaceous (e.g.
Metcalfe 1996; Sribudiyani et al. 2003; Barber et al. 2005;
Whittaker et al. 2007). There is abundant evidence for
subduction-related magmatism since about 45 Ma from
Sumatra eastwards but, in contrast, there is little volcanic record
in the expected position of the volcanic arc during the Late
Volcanic activity
Throughout most of SE Asia, Upper Cretaceous and Paleocene
rocks of all types are almost entirely absent. The evidence for
Late Cretaceous and Early Cenozoic volcanic activity (Fig. 6) is
almost entirely based upon K–Ar ages, mainly from whole-rock
dating, and there are many reasons to be cautious about such
ages (McDougall & Harrison 1988; Harland et al. 1990;
Macpherson & Hall 2002; Villeneuve 2004), particularly in SE
Asia where the effects of tropical weathering are superimposed
on tectonically and thermally altered rocks, commonly with low
potassium contents. If these ages are accepted, they suggest an
interval of significantly diminished volcanic activity, possibly
post-collisional and often interpreted as not directly related to
subduction, succeeded in many parts of the Sundaland margin
by renewed abundant volcanism from the Middle Eocene,
which can be confidently linked to subduction.
Crow (2005) reviewed the record of Cenozoic volcanic
activity in Sumatra. No Upper Cretaceous rocks are known
(Page et al. 1979), but there are a small number of Paleocene
ages reported from boreholes, dykes and a few volcanic rocks,
mainly basalts, which are mostly in south Sumatra (Bellon et al.
2004). The Paleocene Kikim Volcanics include volcanic breccias, tuffs, and basaltic to andesitic lavas. De Smet & Barber
(2005) interpreted a period of erosion in Sumatra between the
Late Cretaceous and Early Eocene, with some volcanic activity
in the area of the Barisan Mountains, although they noted that
the age of the volcanic rocks is poorly constrained. Middle to
Upper Eocene volcanic rocks are known from a few parts of
West Sumatra (Crow 2005). They include subaerial pyroclastics
and lavas interpreted as arc volcanics in Aceh, and volcaniclastic sediments. K–Ar and zircon fission track ages are less than
47 Ma. In Sumatra, prolonged erosion was followed in about
the Middle Eocene by a resumption of volcanic activity which
became widespread from the Late Eocene. Late Eocene to
Early Miocene volcanic activity is indicated by widespread and
abundant volcanic rocks throughout Sumatra.
In Java there is an important Eocene unconformity and few
exposures of older rocks. Central Java includes the most
extensive area of basement rocks, the Lok Ulo Complex
(van Bemmelen 1949; Asikin et al. 1992). This is regarded as the
imbricated product of Cretaceous deformation (e.g. Parkinson
et al. 1998; Wakita 2000) at a subduction margin that extended
from West Java, through the Lok Ulo Complex, to the Meratus
Mountains. The youngest rocks from the Lok Ulo Complex
contain Campanian–Maastrichtian radiolaria with ages of
70–80 Ma (Wakita et al. 1994). The Lok Ulo Complex is
overlain by the Eocene–Oligocene Karangsambung and
Totogan Formations, which include scaly clays with nummulitic
limestone blocks, polymict conglomerates and basalt blocks,
interpreted as deep-water olistostromes (A.H. Harsolumakso,
pers. comm. 2005) or mud diapirs (A.J. Barber, pers. comm.
2008). They lack abundant volcanic material but do contain
large amounts of quartzose debris. In West Java the oldest
rocks are in the Ciletuh area where there are exposures of
‘pre–Tertiary’ (van Bemmelen 1949) peridotites, serpentinites
and gabbros with chloritic schists interpreted as an ophiolitic
tectonic melange (e.g. Parkinson et al. 1998; Martodjojo et al.
136
R. Hall
Fig. 6. Distribution of (A) volcanic
rocks and (B) minor intrusions in
southern Sundaland with ages between
80 and 45 Ma. Sources are cited in the
text. The shaded area is the position of
the Early Cretaceous arc. The total
number of dated rocks is small (63) but
probably does reflect the abundance of
Late Cretaceous to mid-Eocene
volcanic activity.
1978). K–Ar dating provided few results due to alteration
(Schiller et al. 1991). A basalt pebble yielded a Late Cretaceous
age, and a gabbro gave Paleocene to Middle Eocene ages. These
rocks are probably overlain, although subsequently juxtaposed
tectonically (Clements & Hall 2007), by the Middle Eocene
Ciletuh Formation, which includes angular volcaniclastic
material, ophiolitic and chert debris, rare amphibolites, blocks
of nummulitic limestones, and some volcaniclastic sandstones,
incorporated when incompletely lithified. They are interpreted
as deposits of a deep-marine forearc setting (Schiller et al. 1991;
Clements & Hall 2007). In East Java there are a few, very small,
exposures of basement greenschists and marbles (Smyth et al.
2007). The contact with overlying sedimentary rocks, including
nummulitic limestones, is not exposed but is interpreted to
be an unconformity. The oldest sedimentary rocks, in the
Nanggulan area, are fluviatile quartzose conglomerates and
sandstones lacking volcanic debris. These terrestrial deposits
pass rapidly up into Eocene marine deposits, which contain
increasing amounts of volcaniclastic debris up-section. The
stratigraphy indicates an important change in the Middle
Eocene, with initiation of volcanic activity after a prolonged
period of emergence and erosion (Smyth et al. 2007).
In SE Borneo there is also a profound unconformity in the
Meratus Mountains. The exposed basement includes ophiolites,
Cretaceous volcaniclastic rocks (Sikumbang 1986, 1990;
Yuwono et al. 1988) and subduction-related high pressure–low
temperature metamorphic rocks (Parkinson et al. 1998), which
were thrust together during a Late Cenomanian–Early Turonian
arc–continent collision (before c. 91 Ma). The Manunggul
Group (Sikumbang 1986) or Formation (Yuwono 1987;
Yuwono et al. 1988) includes Upper Cretaceous volcanogenic
tuffs and greywackes (91 to 65 Ma) which rest unconformably
on the older rocks and have a molasse character (Yuwono et al.
1988). These rocks are intruded by basaltic to dacitic dykes and
gabbroic to granitic stocks with K–Ar ages from 874 Ma to
724 Ma, interpreted by Yuwono et al. (1988) to be
subduction-related, based on their chemistry. The Manunggul
Formation passes transitionally into the Tanjung Formation
(Yuwono et al. 1988) which consists predominantly of
quartzose clastic sediments and coals. This was originally
interpreted to be Middle and Upper Eocene, but Bon et al.
(1996) interpreted the deepest part of the Tanjung Formation,
dated from three wells, to be Upper Maastrichtian, based on
nannoflora previously regarded as reworked. They interpreted
the Maastrichtian–Paleocene sediments to be deposits of a
passive margin, including minor Paleocene volcanic rocks,
formed after the Cretaceous collision. North of the Meratus
Mountains, in the Kutai Basin, rifting that led to formation of
the Makassar Straits began in the Middle Eocene (Chambers &
Moss 1999; Moss & Chambers 1999) and the oldest Cenozoic
rocks resemble Upper Eocene quartzose clastic sequence in the
Meratus Mountains. Upper Cretaceous volcanic rocks are
known from Kelian (Davies et al. 2008) in the Kutai Basin,
where an inlier of felsic volcaniclastics is surrounded by Eocene
terrestrial and shallow-marine sedimentary rocks. Zircons from
a pumice breccia have a U–Pb age of 67.80.3 Ma, considered
to be the age of eruption (Davies, 2002). Detrital zircon
populations from the Kelian and Mahakam Rivers include
Cretaceous ages from 126.3 to 67.6 Ma (Setiabudi et al. 2001).
Throughout West Sulawesi, Upper Cretaceous formations
include material with an igneous provenance and record minor
volcanic activity (T.M. van Leeuwen, pers. comm., 2007). In
Hydrocarbon basins in SE Asia
137
the Lariang and Karama area of West Sulawesi, the oldest
Cenozoic sedimentary rocks rest in places on volcanic rocks
and volcaniclastic sedimentary rocks that are mainly not well
dated and may be Cretaceous or Paleocene (Calvert 2000;
Calvert & Hall 2007). In the northern part of West Sulawesi the
probable Campanian–Maastrichtian Latimojong Formation is
composed dominantly of marine sedimentary rocks with basaltic to dacitic flows (van Leeuwen & Muhardjo 2005) and there
are volcaniclastic sandstones, tuffs and metabasites in the
Latimojong Mountains further south (A.J. Barber, pers. comm.,
2007). Volcaniclastic rocks contain Precambrian to Cretaceous
zircons and the youngest age population has U–Pb ages of
80–120 Ma (van Leeuwen & Muhardjo 2005). In the southern
part of West Sulawesi, similar rocks are dated in several
places and assigned to a number of different formations. The
Balangbaru Formation (Hasan 1990, 1991) includes olistostromes and turbidite fan deposits with a maximum age range
of Turonian to Maastrichtian age (91–65 Ma). The Marada
Formation (van Leeuwen 1981) is Campanian–Maastrichtian
and includes distal turbidites which contain quartz, fresh
feldspar and andesite fragments as well as volcanic flows or
sills.
Unconformably above the Balangbaru Formation is the Alla
or Bua Formation (Sukamto 1982, 1986; Yuwono 1987),
consisting of volcanic and intrusive rocks with K–Ar ages
ranging from 65–58 Ma, interpreted as subduction-related
(Elburg et al. 2002). This passes upwards into the marginal
marine coal-bearing siliciclastic rocks of the ?Lower–Middle
Eocene Malawa Formation. Further east are the Middle to
Upper Eocene Langi Volcanics (van Leeuwen 1981), which are
predominantly andesitic volcanics with a typical arc geochemistry (Elburg et al. 2002); some volcaniclastic rocks in the lower
part contain zircons with a fission track age of 622 Ma. The
Langi Volcanics are intruded by a tonalite/granodiorite with a
K–Ar age of 52–50 Ma and pass up into Upper Eocene
limestones.
The interpretation of these sequences is not entirely clear. A
post-collision passive margin setting has been suggested (Hasan
1990, 1991; Wakita et al. 1996) for the lower part of the
Balangbaru Formation but igneous debris in the upper part is
suggested to be derived from a continental or magmatic arc and
may indicate a forearc setting (van Leeuwen 1981). The
geochemistry of the Paleocene and Lower Eocene igneous
rocks is generally interpreted to indicate a resumption of
subduction after Cretaceous collision, and Hasan (1990) interpreted a Late Paleocene–Early Eocene arc, but, if this was the
case, the episode of subduction seems to have been short lived.
All these rocks are overlain by sedimentary sequences typical of
marginal and shallow marine conditions, including platform
carbonates (Wilson et al. 2000), suggesting widespread rifting
around the present Makassar Straits, which began in the Middle
Eocene (Moss & Chambers 1999; Calvert & Hall 2007).
On Sumba there are Upper Cretaceous–Paleocene rocks of
the Lasipu Formation resembling the deep-marine turbidites of
West Sulawesi in which there are some volcanic rocks (Burollet
& Salle 1981). Abdullah et al. (2000) identified two calcalkaline magmatic episodes by K–Ar dating, one Santonian–
Campanian (86–77 Ma) and the other Maastrichtian–Paleocene
(71–56 Ma), which they interpreted as the result of subduction
at the Sundaland margin producing an Andean magmatic arc.
However, the area of volcanic activity is small.
Paleocene granites distributed across a very large area of
Sundaland (Fig. 7). The majority of dated granites are Early
Cretaceous, and 215 of the 299 ages are older than 80 Ma. For
obvious reasons there is little information from offshore, and
there are some parts of Indochina for which there is little
information, such as Cambodia. None the less, it is difficult to
see linear belts that might be expected if they are subduction
products, and many granites are far from probable subduction
zones.
Some granites could be part of an east-facing Andean
margin that continued south from South China. Cretaceous
granites are known in North China but it is still debated if they
were formed at a subduction margin (e.g. Lin & Wang 2006; Li
& Li 2007; Yang et al. 2007). Jahn et al. (1976) argued that there
was a Cretaceous (120–90 Ma) thermal episode in the SE China
margin which may be related to west-directed Pacific subduction. In South China, around Hong Kong, acid magmatism
ceased in the Early Cretaceous (Sewell et al. 2000) but midCretaceous granites are reported from Vietnam (Nguyen et al.
2004; Thuy et al. 2004) with youngest ages of 88 Ma. If this was
part of an Andean margin it is unclear if and where it continued
to the south.
The north–south belt of granites that follows the Thailand–
Burma border is plausibly related to NE- or east-directed
subduction of the Indian plate (e.g. Mitchell 1993; Barley et al.
2003). Early Cretaceous granites continue south into the Malay
peninsula and Sumatra (Fig. 7A) and could be related to this
subduction.
Granite magmatism in Borneo might be explained as the
product of flat-slab subduction from the west or south, but the
positions of the Cretaceous arcs of southern Sundaland are well
known in Sumatra, Java and SE Borneo (Hamilton 1979;
Parkinson et al. 1998; Barber et al. 2005) and are far outboard of
most of the granites. The Cretaceous granites in the Schwaner
Mountains (Williams et al. 1988) and western Sarawak (Tate
2001) have been interpreted as the product of Andean-type
magmatism associated with subduction dipping beneath
Borneo. If SE Sundaland was rotated by 90 from its present
position, as suggested by palaeomagnetic studies of Borneo
(Fuller et al. 1999), it is possible that the Schwaner granites
could be the product of subduction at the East Asian margin.
Alternatively, if SW Borneo is an accreted continental fragment
that originated in the south, it is possible that granite magmatism was associated with south-directed subduction during its
northward movement in the Early Cretaceous.
The granites older than about 80 Ma may thus be explained
by subduction of the Indian Plate or Pacific plates. However,
the younger granites in the area of Sumatra, Java and Borneo
are less abundant and scattered across a wide area. A possible
explanation is that they are products of collisional thickening.
Further north in Sundaland, younger granites have been interpreted as the product of thickening following continental
collision (Barley et al. 2003). It is suggested here that Late
Cretaceous and Paleocene, and possibly some of the widespread Early Cretaceous, granites of Borneo and the Sunda
Shelf represent post-collisional magmatism following Cretaceous accretion of the SW Borneo continental fragment or the
East Java–West Sulawesi continental fragment (see below).
This would account for their widespread distribution.
Widespread Cretaceous granite magmatism
In contrast to the paucity of volcanic rocks of Late Cretaceous
and Early Cenozoic age, there are abundant Cretaceous and
Many authors have assumed or implied that subduction at the
Sundaland active margin was continuous through the Late
Mesozoic into the Cenozoic (e.g. Yuwono et al. 1988; Metcalfe
LATE CRETACEOUS TO MIDDLE EOCENE
TECTONIC SETTING
138
R. Hall
1996; Soeria-Atmadja et al. 1994, 1998; Abdullah et al. 2000;
Sribudiyani et al. 2003) with an Andean magmatic arc stretching
from Sumatra to West Sulawesi. Most granite magmatism in
Indonesia that could be associated with an Andean-margin is
older than 80 Ma. Furthermore, as observed above, there is
little evidence of volcanic activity in Sumatra, none in Java, very
little in SE Borneo, and only in West Sulawesi and Sumba can
a case be made for subduction-related volcanic activity. Volcanic rocks are mainly flows or sills associated with deepmarine turbidites, and some volcaniclastic debris could be
reworked from older arc rocks. The arc itself is not seen.
Volcanic activity had ceased by the end of the Eocene in SW
Sulawesi, although probably continued into the Oligocene
further north; its distribution in time and space suggests that it
was localized and intermittent, and radiometric age dates and
stratigraphic information suggest little or no volcanism between
30 and 19 Ma (T.M. van Leeuwen, pers. comm. 2007). The
arguments for subduction-related volcanic activity are based on
the subduction-character of the geochemistry, but the subduction signature could simply reflect post-collisional magmatism
(Macpherson & Hall 2002). However, even if there was
subduction beneath Sumba and West Sulawesi this does not
require subduction in other parts of the Indonesian margin.
In contrast, some authors have either explicitly suggested
that parts of the Sundaland margin were passive from the Late
Cretaceous to the Eocene, or implied a passive margin by
identifying Cenozoic resumption of subduction (e.g. Hamilton
1979; Hasan 1990, 1991; Daly et al. 1991; Bon et al. 1996; Carlile
& Mitchell 1994; Wakita et al. 1996; Parkinson et al. 1998).
Parkinson et al. (1998) suggested that subduction ceased in the
Cretaceous after collision of a Gondwana continental fragment
that is now beneath most of West Sulawesi. Carlile & Mitchell
(1994) surmised that a collision of the Woyla Arc in Sumatra
was connected to collision and ophiolite emplacement in the
Meratus Mountains. The age and character of volcanic and
sedimentary rocks from SE Borneo and Sulawesi are consistent
with a major change in regime at about 90 Ma following
collision. Smyth et al. (2005, 2007) have shown that there is a
continental crust beneath the Southern Mountains of East Java,
and Smyth et al. (2007) proposed that a continental fragment
collided in the Cretaceous and terminated subduction. The ages
of radiolaria in accreted deep-marine sediments in Central Java
show the youngest subduction-related rocks are about 80 Ma. It
is therefore suggested here that subduction ceased all around
the south Sundaland margin in the Late Cretaceous, at about 90
to 80 Ma (Fig. 8), and was not resumed until the Middle
Fig. 7. Distribution of Cretaceous granites in southern Sundaland.
There may be more Cretaceous granites offshore beneath the Sunda
Shelf, based on personal communications from oil company geologists. (A) Granites older than 110 Ma, suggested to be the age of
docking of the SW Borneo block. (B) Granites with ages between
110 and 80 Ma, suggested to be the age of docking of the East
Java–West Sulawesi block. (C) Cretaceous to Paleocene granites.
The shaded area is the position of the Early Cretaceous arc. Unfilled
squares on (A) are Cretaceous but with no precise age (ESCAP
1994; Koning 2003). All other samples are radiometrically dated
(Kirk 1968; Gobbett & Hutchison 1973; Pupilli 1973; Patmosukismo
& Yahya 1974; Garson et al. 1975; Bignell & Snelling 1977; Haile
et al. 1977; Beckinsale et al. 1979; Ishihara et al. 1980; Putthapiban &
Gray 1983; Putthapiban 1984, 1992; van de Weerd et al. 1987;
Darbyshire & Swainbank 1988; Williams et al. 1988, 1989; Yuwono
et al. 1988; Seong 1990; Krähenbuhl 1991; Cobbing et al. 1992;
Nakapadungrat & Puttapiban 1992; Amiruddin & Trail 1993;
Charusiri et al. 1993; de Keyser & Rustandi 1993; Nakapadungrat &
Maneenai 1993; Pieters & Sanyoto 1993; Pieters et al. 1993; Supriatna
et al. 1993; Wikarno et al. 1993; Dunning et al. 1995; Dirk 1997;
Hartono 1997; Utoyo 1997; Nguyen et al. 2004; Cobbing, 2005).
Hydrocarbon basins in SE Asia
Fig. 8. Reconstruction for the Late Cretaceous after collision of the
SW Borneo block (SWB), and the later addition of the East Java (EJ)
and West Sulawesi (WS) blocks (shaded dark) which terminated
subduction beneath Sundaland. The inferred positions of these
blocks on the West Australian margin in the Late Jurassic at about
155 Ma are shown by the numbered codes (SWB155, WS155 and
EJ155). A transform or very leaky transform spreading centre is
inferred to have separated the Indian and Australian Plates between
80 and 45 Ma as India moved rapidly northwards.
Eocene, at about 45 Ma. The very limited amount of volcanic
activity between 90 and 45 Ma is interpreted as localized
post-collisional magmatism, with the exception of West
Sulawesi and Sumba where there was some west-directed
subduction.
A similar scenario can be inferred for the north side of the
Sundaland promontory. Deep-marine sediments of the
Cretaceous–Eocene Rajang Group form much of the Central
Borneo Mountains and Crocker Ranges in north Borneo and
have been widely interpreted as deposits of an active margin
(Haile 1969, 1974; Hamilton 1979; Holloway 1982; Hutchison
1973, 1989, 1996a, b; Williams et al. 1988, 1989). According to
Hutchison (1996b), deposition of Rajang Group sediments was
terminated by a Sarawak orogeny suggested to represent an
intra-Eocene collision between a Balingian–Luconia and the
Schwaner Mountains continents. In contrast, Moss (1998)
presented evidence that the Rajang Group sediments were
deposited at a passive margin. Thus, an alternative interpretation of the Late Cretaceous to Eocene setting is that the
Sarawak ‘orogeny’ marks the Middle Eocene initiation of
subduction of the proto-South China Sea beneath northern
Borneo, at the former passive margin, rather than a collision.
The new subduction zone dipped towards the southeast and
was active from the Eocene until the Early Miocene (e.g. Tan &
Lamy 1990; Hazebroek & Tan 1993; Hall 1996; Hutchison et al.
2000).
Furthermore, considering tectonics at a much larger scale,
although there is good evidence from magnetic anomalies south
of India for its rapid northward movement in the Late
Cretaceous and Early Cenozoic, and hence subduction to the
north of India, the magnetic anomalies south of Australia
indicate very slow separation of Australia and Antarctica until
139
about 45 Ma (Royer & Sandwell 1989). Hence, there is no
requirement for subduction beneath Indonesia and, indeed, the
only way in which subduction could have been maintained
during the Late Cretaceous and Early Cenozoic is to propose a
hypothetical spreading centre between Australia and Sundaland
which moved northward until it was subducted (e.g. Whittaker
et al. 2007). Ridge subduction is often suggested to produce slab
windows associated with volumetrically or compositionally
unusual magmatism (e.g. Thorkelson & Taylor 1989; Hole et al.
1995; Thorkelson 1996; Gorring & Kay 2001). A slab window
should have swept westward beneath Java and Sumatra during
the Late Cretaceous and Paleocene according to the Whittaker
et al. (2007) model, but there is no evidence for it; indeed, as
observed above, there is no magmatism of this age in Java, and
almost none in Sumatra.
Thus, the new view proposed here of the large-scale tectonic
setting during the Late Cretaceous and Early Cenozoic between
India and SE Asia is that it was markedly different in the west
compared to the east. West of about 100E, India was moving
rapidly northward and was yet to collide with Asia. East of
about 100E, there was no subduction. Australia was still far to
the south and, although Australia–Antarctica separation had
begun in the Cretaceous, the rate and amount was small until
the Eocene. The difference between east and west implies a
broadly transform boundary between the Indian and Australian
plates at about 100E. Such a feature is supported by anomaly
ages on the unsubducted Indian Plate in the Wharton Basin
south of Sumatra where there are large distances between
anomalies across fracture zones indicating northward transform
offset of the Late Cretaceous to Eocene spreading centre of
c. 1700 km (anomaly 28) at 90E and a further c. 1100 km
(anomaly 28) between 90E and 100E (Sclater & Fisher 1974)
or a total of c. 2000 km (anomaly 28) between the end
Cretaceous spreading centre west of 90E and that east of
100E (Royer & Sandwell 1989). Similar large offsets are
suggested to have continued north on the now subducted
boundary between the Indian and Australian Plates (Fig. 8).
At the beginning of the Cenozoic there was no northward
subduction, and Sundaland is interpreted to have been an
elevated continent due to the Cretaceous collisions of continental blocks. South of Sumatra and Java, east of about 100E,
it is suggested that there was a passive margin. This passive
margin continued all round eastern Sundaland, which was
separated from South China by the proto-South China Sea. The
margins changed from passive to active in the Eocene as
Australia began to move rapidly north. South-directed subduction began beneath north Borneo while north-directed subduction began south of Sumatra and Java.
EOCENE RESUMPTION OF SUBDUCTION AND
ITS CONSEQUENCES
Only from about 45 Ma did Australia begin to separate significantly from Antarctica, and to move rapidly northwards, and
this caused subduction to resume at the Sundaland margins.
The resumption of subduction initiated an active margin on the
south side of Sundaland forming the Sunda Arc, and another
active margin on the north side of Sundaland in north Borneo.
In most of Sumatra, volcanic activity became widespread from
the Middle Eocene (Crow 2005). In Java, volcanic activity
began in the Middle Eocene to form an arc that ran the length
of the island (Hall & Smyth 2008; Smyth et al. 2008; Clements
et al. 2009). In Sulawesi the Langi andesitic volcanics (van
Leeuwen 1981; Elburg et al. 2002) may represent a Middle to
Late Eocene episode of subduction-related volcanism. On
Sumba there was a significant episode of Eocene to Oligocene
140
R. Hall
volcanism (Abdullah et al. 2000). The Sunda Arc continued east
into the Pacific (Hall 2002).
Subduction also resumed on the north side of the Sundaland
promontory at about 45 Ma, and an active margin ran from
Sarawak east towards the Philippines (Hall 1996, 2002). In
north Borneo, in the Eocene to Early Miocene, there was
southeast-directed subduction (Hall & Wilson 2000; Hutchison
et al. 2000) and the Crocker Fan (van Hattum et al. 2006)
formed above the subduction zone at the active margin. There
was relatively little Eocene to Early Miocene subduction-related
magmatism (Kirk 1968; Hutchison et al. 2000; Prouteau et al.
2001) in Borneo, probably because the proto-South China Sea
narrowed westwards (Hall 1996, 2002).
However, the most important effect was the initiation of
widespread rifting throughout Sundaland leading to subsidence
and accumulation of vast amounts of sediment in sedimentary
basins. It is suggested here that this rifting was a response to the
regional stresses imposed on Sundaland during the breaking of
the plate which was required in order to begin subduction.
SUBDUCTION INITIATION
Starting subduction is widely considered to be a very difficult
process (McKenzie 1977; Mueller & Phillips 1991) for which
the dynamics remain poorly understood (Cloetingh et al. 1982;
Toth & Gurnis 1998), and has been described as a fundamental,
yet poorly understood, process (Hall et al. 2003) or as one of
the unresolved problems of plate tectonics (Regenaur-Lieb et al.
2001). None the less, the process must occur regularly and
continuously, since long-lived subduction zones disappear and
new ones form in other places (Toth & Gurnis 1998). Since
McKenzie’s (1977) demonstration that creating trenches is
difficult, the problem has been investigated theoretically using
numerical and analogue modelling, and most studies have
concentrated on breaking a plate in two types of tectonic
setting: within an oceanic plate and at a passive continental
margin.
There is still considerable uncertainty. It is generally agreed
that the stresses required to initiate subduction are very large
(McKenzie 1977; Cloetingh et al. 1982; Mueller & Phillips 1991)
and, therefore, there have been many suggestions that oceanic
lithosphere may break at pre-existing zones of weakness, such
as transform faults and fracture zones (Toth & Gurnis 1998;
Hall et al. 2003), especially those that are serpentinized (Hilairet
et al. 2007). Lateral buoyancy contrasts may also be important,
such as might be found at the edges of large oceanic plateaux
(Niu et al. 2003). In numerical modelling the assumption of
rheology is important; a non-Newtonian viscosity may make
subduction initiation easier (Billen & Hirth 2005) and convergence rate is also a significant factor (Hall et al. 2003; Billen &
Hirth 2005).
All modelling confirms that old passive margins are difficult
to turn into subduction zones. Increasing the age of passive
margin does not make it easier to initiate subduction (Cloetingh
et al. 1982) and the negative buoyancy of old oceanic lithosphere is insufficient in itself to lead to trench formation. Again,
pre-existing weaknesses may be important (Cohen 1982) and
faults may be reactivated if convergence is oblique (Erickson
1993). Sediment loading of young lithosphere may play a part
(Cloetingh et al. 1982), and sediment loading over long periods
(c. 100 Ma) may trigger subduction (Regenaur-Lieb et al. 2001).
Water may play an important role in weakening young lithosphere beneath a sediment load (Regenaur-Lieb et al. 2001).
Faccenna et al. (1999) described three scenarios based on
analogue modelling. The first produces only folding of oceanic
lithosphere and no subduction is initiated at the passive margin;
this resembles the situation south of India at the present day
(Martinod & Molnar 1995). In this case, it is easier to deform
continental Asia than break the plate (Stern 2004). In the two
other cases, either an Atlantic-type passive margin evolves over
a long period to form a trench or, in the other, the continent
collapses towards the ocean, producing back-arc extension and
subduction, resembling the Mediterranean. The result depends
on the brittle and ductile strength of the passive margin, the
negative buoyancy of the oceanic lithosphere, and the horizontal body forces between continent and ocean. Mart et al. (2005)
also experimented with analogue models, but in a centrifuge,
and suggested that lateral density differences at continental
margins may influence the initiation of subduction.
McKenzie (1977), Mueller & Phillips (1991) and Toth &
Gurnis (1998) all included inclined pre-existing faults in their
models, but Mueller & Phillips (1991) differed in their estimate
of resisting stresses on the faults and consequently found
subduction initiation to be very unlikely. McKenzie (1977) and
Toth & Gurnis (1998) agreed on the magnitude of the stresses
required, but McKenzie (1977) concluded that ridge-push
forces were insufficient to cause subduction initiation, whereas
Toth & Gurnis (1998) argued that they were sufficient, and that
combined with additional forces from adjacent subduction
zones, subduction initiation is not difficult and expected to be
common in the Western Pacific. Observations around SE Asia
where there are numerous young subduction zones that have
initiated in the last 15 Ma, including the Manila, Negros,
Cotobato, North Sulawesi and Philippine Trenches (e.g.
Cardwell et al. 1980; Karig 1982; Hall 1996, 2002), support this
conclusion. All have developed at the boundaries between
ocean crust and thickened arc crust, typically at the edges of
small basins, where there is both a topographic and buoyancy
contrast.
SETTING OF BASIN FORMATION
Features that have been identified in different models as
important or critical were present during the Eocene at the
Sundaland margins, including pre-existing dipping faults, bathymetric and buoyancy contrasts, weak serpentinized zones,
and probable considerable sediment loads. Early Cretaceous
Sundaland had been surrounded by active margins and Karig
(1982) identified former subduction zone margins which he
called ‘deactivated continental or arc margins’ to be likely sites
of subduction initiation. At about 45 Ma, Australia began to
separate rapidly from Antarctica, hence increasing ridge-push
stresses on the Sundaland margin. SE Asia today, and during
the Cenozoic, has been the site of exceptionally high rates of
sediment supply (e.g. Milliman et al. 1999; Hall & Nichols 2002;
Suggate & Hall 2003; Hall & Morley 2004), and it is likely that
much of Sundaland was elevated following Cretaceous collisions. Thus, a considerable sediment load at the Sundaland
margins is probable.
It is not easy to identify the consequences of subduction
initiation on the region from the present limited understanding
of the process and, therefore, the following scenario is somewhat speculative. I suggest that in the Middle Eocene, the
Sundaland region went into regional compression as Australia
attempted to move north (Fig. 9). This would have meant
approximate N–S compression and, in consequence, approximately E–W extension, causing basins to form. The local
extension direction varied considerably, initially because of
variations in basement fabric and, later, because once subduction began, these were augmented by other forces around
Sundaland due to the different types and orientations of plate
Hydrocarbon basins in SE Asia
141
Fig. 9. The situation just before and
just after subduction began beneath
Sundaland at about 45 Ma. The
initiation of subduction required the
plate to be broken at the Sundaland
continental margin and it is suggested
that compression induced broadly E–W
extensional stresses, which were locally
re-orientated by basement structures.
After subduction was initiated, plate
edge forces became increasingly
important.
boundaries. There has been little work on topographic effects
as subduction begins, although Toth & Gurnis (1998) showed
that in their models a long wavelength depression developed on
the overriding plate with a wavelength of c. 400 km. All the
models, numerical and analogues, have used simple and typical
strengths for different types of lithosphere but, as summarized
above, Sundaland is not typical (Hall & Morley 2004) and there
is a very large region of weak lithosphere extending more than
900 km to the north of the Sunda Trench (Hyndman et al. 2005;
Currie & Hyndman 2006) where plate boundary forces are
greater than the strength of the plate in compression.
Thus, once subduction had started it is likely that stresses in
different parts of Sundaland varied considerably, leading to
reactivation of different structures in the various basins at
different times, and resulting in changing orientations of faults,
multiple episodes of extension, and inversion. For example, the
extension direction observed in the Nam Con Son and Cuu
Long basins is likely to reflect an interaction of the regional
stresses imposed by subduction initiation, basement structures
in the Vietnam margin, slab-pull forces due to southeastdirected subduction of the proto-South China Sea, and far-field
effects of India–Asia convergence. The tectonic development
of SE Asia in the last 45 Ma (Hall 2002), involving subduction,
hinge movements, arc and microcontinent collisions, and new
ocean basin formation, led to a complex and frequently
changing distribution of forces at the Sundaland margin; Hall &
142
R. Hall
Morley (2004) illustrated these changing forces in a schematic
way for different intervals during the Cenozoic and Figure 9
shows the possible forces that influenced basin formation and
orientation of local extensional stresses just before and just
after subduction began. The subsequent development of the
basins, including such features as relative age and sedimentary
fill, importance of continental rift inheritance for source and
reservoir distribution, and heat flow histories, is described and
discussed elsewhere (e.g. Williams et al. 1995; Howes & Noble
1997; Longley 1997; Petronas 1999; Hall & Morley 2004; Doust
& Sumner 2007).
CONCLUSIONS
Although it is now widely accepted that the Sundaland basins
are dominantly extensional, the origin of the extensional forces
remains uncertain. McKenzie-type models are widely applied,
but the setting of SE Asian basins is very different from
intra-continental rifts like the North Sea, or passive margins like
those of the Atlantic, where such models were developed and
work well. India–Asia collision was not the cause of basin
formation. Even if the indentor model is accepted, the timing
of basin initiation is earlier than major movements on the
strike-slip faults and there are many other counter arguments
discussed elsewhere (e.g. Morley 2002; Hall & Morley 2004;
Hall et al. 2008). The collision is often identified as a cause in
rather a mystical manner with no clear indication of what was
happening, or where India was in relation to SE Asia. Furthermore, there is now doubt about the timing of India–Asia
collision which may be significantly younger than previously
accepted. Basin formation was well underway before the end
Eocene age for continent–continent collision proposed by
Aitchison et al. (2007).
Most of the models proposed for basin formation could be
right in the sense that all could apply somewhere in the
Sundaland region. The regional compression proposed here
would cause extension by pure or simple shear, but a variety of
different local stress systems may result from other influences,
such as local basement structure, reactivated faults, shape of the
continental margin, type of crust on each side of the new plate
boundary, and locally weak or strong layers within the lithosphere. The composite character of the Sundaland lithosphere
means that all of these could apply and local principal stresses
could vary considerably around the region.
It is most likely that the plate broke by a tear propagating
through the region from an existing plate boundary. This
suggests a west to east propagation of the tear from North
Sumatra eastwards. However, this is speculative, and the
character and orientation of plate boundaries at the Pacific end
of the system are not known. The weakness of the lithosphere
in the region means that many basins did not subsequently have
simple histories. Many are characterized by changing stresses,
reflected, for example, in multiple episodes of extension and
different directions of extension. This is due to changing
balance of forces at plate edges and their interaction with
basement fabric, all driven by multiple subduction-related
processes. Subduction has been the most important influence
on SE Asia for all of its history, and still is.
The author is grateful to the University of London Central Research
Fund, the Royal Society and the Natural Environment Research
Council for support, but especially to the consortium of oil
companies who have supported projects in SE Asia for many years.
Thanks to colleagues in Indonesia at the Pusat Survei Geologi
Bandung, Lemigas, Indonesian Institute of Sciences, and Institut
Teknologi Bandung, and many colleagues, friends and students in
the UK, Europe and SE Asia. Theo van Leeuwen and Tony Barber
are thanked for suggestions and comments on some of the ideas in
this paper.
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Received 12 November 2008; revised typescript accepted 5 February 2009.