The Carboniferous Southern Pennine Basin, UK

Many of the Carboniferous outcrops located in the Derbyshire region of the Peak District National Park, UK, have provided sites for both significant and pioneering research relating to the clastic sedimentology of marine palaeoenvironments, particularly so during the 1960s and 1970s when early models describing the sedimentary architecture of fluvio-deltaic, submarine-slope and deep-marine submarine-fan sedimentation were first developed. The area was subject to hydrocarbon exploration from the 1920s to 1950s, which although unsuccessful in economic terms left a legacy of sub-surface data. Despite a long-history of sedimentological research, the deposits exposed at several classic localities in the Pennine Basin continue to broaden and challenge our current understanding of sedimentary processes to this day.