Early development and late preservation of porosity linked to presence of hydrocarbons in Precambrian microbialite gas reservoirs within the Sichuan Basin, southern China

The ancient Ediacaran Dengying Formation consists of microbialites with unusually high porosity that represent a large proportion of the Weiyuan-Anyue gas reservoirs in southwestern China’s Sichuan Basin. However, a clear model for the development and preservation of these microbialite reservoirs has yet not been determined. We used samples from outcrops and borehole cores to characterize these microbialites and propose a model for early...