New Research Reveals Sediment Flows Shape California's Seafloor Pockmarks

Study overturns long-held belief that methane gas eruptions formed the Sur Pockmark Field, impacting offshore wind farm planning.

Researchers from MBARI, USGS, and Stanford found no evidence of methane at the Sur Pockmark Field.
Advanced underwater robots mapped the seafloor and collected sediment samples.
Sediment gravity flows, not methane, maintain the pockmarks over hundreds of thousands of years.
The findings are crucial for assessing the stability of potential offshore wind farm sites.
The study was published in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface.