[copious.abundance]

It had been my understanding that the eastern half of the Mediterranean Sea was underlain by sedimentary basins (such as shown on this map here) but I had wondered if it had ever been explored for oil. Then I just encountered the following article about oil in Syria. Most of the article talks about oil exploration onshore Syria (you can ignore that if you want), but the following passage at the end caught my eye.
--> LINK <--
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'E')xperts say the basin of east Mediterranean extends between Italy and the Gulf of Serte in Libya in the west and the al-Ghab plains (Syria), Bekaa valley (Lebanon), the Dead Sea (occupied Palestine) and the Red Sea (Egypt) in the east. Oil fields in Serte and the Delta gas fields in Egypt are the most important discovery in the Med. region. New surveys showed the existence of big sea structures, especially "Eratoshenes" south of Cyprus. This structure is 100 kilometre long and 90 km width. Another 50 km-long structure is located in west of Tartous and reaches up to the coast of Lattakia. The "Levantine" structure in the basin of Lattakia has a sedimentation cover of 12 km thickness. Experts confirm that seismic and geological surveys have shown that the big basin of the east Med. region is rich in oil and gas crude and large reserve quantities are promising.

[copious.abundance]

Hmmm.
--> International oil firms show interest in Cyprus’ oil and gas exploration<--
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'A')ccording to France’s Beicep-Franlab, which analysed the seismic data, 17 major concept plays have been identified and the play fairways are of considerable size.

Speaking at the launch, Lucien Montadert said the “existence of active petroleum systems is assured,” adding that in view of discoveries made offshore Egypt, it was likely that gas and condensate were present and that the presence of crude oil could not be excluded. Montadert said play concepts were spread throughout the area and that there were a variety of structures.

The Director of Energy Service at the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism Solon Kassinis said the Cyprus offshore area could be gas prone but added that the Eratosthenes structure “might even lead us to oil.”

[copious.abundance]

OK I just found this from the government of Cypress:
--> Overview of seismic survey - (PDF, quite large) <--

On pages 11-13 it's got some seismic readings for this "Eratosthenes structure." Anyone know how to interpret these things?

Thanks. This is as much for my own education as anything else.

[rockdoc123]

The seismic lines shown illustrate very large structures but the main risk in this area is for reservoir. The bright amplitudes on the seismic could be interpreted as gas-bearing sands (same response that shows up in seismic in the Nile Delta) but it is a non-unique solution and the amplitudes could be for a host of other reasons. They seem to make much ado about discoveries in Egypt (Mango-1) and offshore Israel (Yam) that found oil in Cretaceous turbidites. Unfortunately those discoveries were made a couple of decades ago and all attempts have failed to repeat them. The offshore Nile Delta Tertiary sands have been very successful for gas in the past few years but there is no recent sediment source of that age offshore either Syria or Cyprus.

[copious.abundance]

Thanks rockdoc, that was very helpful. I'll keep an eye on this, but not too closely.

[Keith_McClary]

Turkey threatens ‘necessary response’ over Cyprus gas drilling
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')urkey’s foreign minister says his country will show the “necessary response” to Cyprus if it goes ahead with plans to start exploratory drilling for gas deposits.

Ahmet Davutoglu said Friday Cyprus had no right to go ahead with efforts to search for gas before a settlement to reunify the divided island is reached. He did not say what Turkey’s response would be.

Cyprus has been split between a Greek Cypriot south and a breakaway Turkish Cypriot north since 1974.

Turkey opposes the Greek Cypriot government’s search for offshore gas saying it disregards Turkish Cypriots’ rights. It also believes the search would damage long-running talks aimed at reunification.

The Greek Cypriot government has said Turkish Cypriots could share in the potential bounty after a peace accord is signed.