Petrography, diagenesis and reservoir characteristics of the Pre-Cenomanian sandstone, Sheikh Attia area, East Central Sinai, Egypt

Petrographic observations showed that the Early Paleozoic sandstones are texturally immature owing to the abundance of angular grains, non-uniformity of grain size, high amounts of matrix clay mineral, and high amounts of feldspar grains. The Early Cretaceous sandstones have low amounts of rock fragments, clay minerals, and feldspars grains. Statistical analysis of the petrophysical data confirms that the reservoir quality of Early Cretaceous sandstone is higher than that of Early Paleozoic sandstones (the reservoir quality index of Early Cretaceous sandstone is 0.383 μm and for Early Paleozoic sandstones is 0.205 μm).