Geological controls over stacked Quaternary pockmark distributions above the Horda Platform, northern North Sea

Summary Pockmarks are fluid escape structures that indicate paleo-expulsion events within sedimentary basins. The Troll pockmark field is one of the world’s largest, and is located in the Horda Platform area within Norwegian Channel of the northern North Sea. The Quaternary succession hosts a set of stacked pockmarked surfaces, providing a viable opportunity to elucidate the potential geological controls over pockmark distributions in the region at different stages of the Quaternary Period. We mapped buried and seafloor pockmarks above the Horda Platform in order to determine pockmark density trends and assess potential correlations with relevant geological features above and below the Upper Regional Unconformity (URU). Positive correlations then provide evidence that further corroborate the possibility that thermogenically sourced methane drove Quaternary pockmark formation.