AndreaBozzo/ceres-open-data-index huggingface dataset:
2003 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA4 Technical report - Plankton (north UKCS)

This report is a contribution to the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA4) conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry. The plankton community in the SEA4 area is similar to that in the North Sea, with variations in the abundances of some individual species. Emphasis in this review is put on trends in the abundances of major phytoplankton and zooplankton taxa over the last 40 years. The study is based on a unique long-term dataset of plankton abundance in the North Atlantic and the North Sea acquired by the Continuous Plankton Recorder (CPR). In the phytoplankton community, conspicuous trends are the steady increase in Phytoplankton Colour (an indicator of phytoplankton biomass) since 1960 and the mid 1980s peak in Thalassiosira spp. abundance. Among the zooplankton the decline in the abundance of Calanus finmarchicus and the increase in that of Calanus helgolandicus since 1960 are probably related to increasing sea surface temperatures in the northeast Atlantic. Phytoplankton blooms are discussed, from the normal annual blooms to harmful algal blooms (HABs). Because of the extensive fish farm industry in coastal regions of SEA4, there is considerable interest and ongoing research into HABs, but there is no clear evidence that they are increasing in frequency or intensity due to anthropogenic eutrophication. Other important components of the plankton meroplankton, picoplankton and megaplankton are also reviewed.

Tags: Species distribution
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)
2004 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA5 Technical Report - Other users (North Sea)

This report is a contribution to the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA5) conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry (now Department of Energy and Climate Change). The SEA 5 area covers parts of the central and northern North Sea to the east of the Scottish mainland, Orkney and Shetland. The area supports different users and activities, many of which are focussed in particular coastal and marine areas. This report presents an initial overview of the coastal population of the SEA 5 area and the industries and activities which utilise the SEA 5 area including: Oil and gas activity; Commercial fishing; Fisheries for migratory species; Ports and shipping; Mariculture; Military activity; Telecommunication cables; Renewable energy; Aggregate extraction; Marine disposal; Tourism and leisure; Locally important activities; Coastal and marine archaeology; Coastal and marine management initiatives

Tags: Energy resources, Production and industrial facilities
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)
2003 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA4 Technical report - Seafloor sediments and sediment processes on the outer continental shelf, continental slope and basin floor (north UKCS)

This report is a contribution to the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA4) conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry (now Department of Energy and Climate Change). The report describes the surficial sediments in the SEA4 area and the sedimentary processes that are active in the area at the present day. The report focuses on the deeper water areas from the outer continental shelf to the floor of the Norwegian Basin in the northernmost part of SEA4. The report is based on sidescan sonar images, multibeam bathymetry, sub-bottom profiles, seabed photographs and sediment samples. The Holocene and late glacial events and processes that contributed to the present day seafloor morphology and sediment distribution are reviewed, as is the present day oceanographic regime. It is concluded that the present day sedimentary environment, seaward of the continental shelf edge at about 200 m water depth, is dominated by low sediment input and deposition rates, and by reworking of surficial sediments by bottom currents. The large scale seabed morphology was shaped mainly during the last glacial, when high sediment input resulted in glacigenic debris fan formation.

Tags: Geology
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)
2003 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA4 Technical report - Sub-seabed geology (north UKCS)

This report is a contribution to the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA4) conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry (now Department of Energy and Climate Change). This report summarises the geological history of the SEA4 area from Pre-Cambrian times to the present day, sets the framework in which oil and gas fields have been discovered to the west of Shetland, and discusses the seismicity of the area. A generalised geological map of the area is presented and three approximately NW-SE trending sections across the southern part of the SEA4 area are shown. The petroleum geology of the area is reviewed and the geological settings in which oil has been found at the Clair, Foinaven, Schiehallion and Loyal oilfields is described. Other hydrocarbon fields to the west of Shetland, for which there are no immediate development plans, are briefly touched on. The seismicity of the SEA4 area, which is very low, is discussed.

Tags: Geology
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)
2003 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA4 Technical report - Shallow benthos (north UKCS)

This report is a contribution to the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA4) conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry (now Department of Energy and Climate Change). It is a synthesis of information describing the seabed habitats, species and communities on the continental shelf of the west of Orkney and Shetland relevant to the SEA 4 area. It provides a summary of the benthic communities and assemblages which inhabit the shallow waters of the SEA4 area, from littoral to offshore areas. A wide range of habitats exist in the area because of the heterogeneity of the seafloor environment, ranging from hard rock sites exposed to the full force of waves and tidal currents to muddy sediments in sheltered inlets. The shelf and offshore areas include varying bedforms of sand and gravel, some of high carbonate content, and considerable amounts of glacigenic material. The epifauna and infauna which inhabit these different environments are summarised. A section of the report discusses the environmental impacts of anthropogenic activities in the area. These include the harvesting of algae from rocky shores, the release of radionuclides on the Caithness coast (Dounreay), dredging for sedimentary material, trawling and mariculture, in addition to the offshore oil and gas industry.

Tags: Habitats and biotopes, Species distribution
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)
2003 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA4 Technical report - Existing users and management initiatives (north UKCS)

This report is a contribution to the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA4) conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry (now Department of Energy and Climate Change). This report is a synthesis of information on human activities which might have an impact on, or themselves be affected by, further oil and gas developments in the SEA4 area. The activities include fishing, mariculture, shipping, energy (both existing oil and gas developments and renewable energy), telecommunications, military activities, waste disposal, dredging and aggregate extraction, tourism, coastal and marine archaeological sites. 

The SEA4 area hosts a wide variety of different users. Some have been there for centuries, others are more recent arrivals. Among the older industries and activities are fisheries, ports and shipping and military activities; the oil and gas industry and mariculture are newer arrivals. Orkney and Shetland have provided major infrastructure for the North Sea oil and gas industry since the 1970s, and there have been producing oil fields to the west of Shetland since 1997. Finfish and shellfish farming are important industries in the coastal regions of the SEA4 area.

Tags: Energy resources, Production and industrial facilities
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)
2005 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA6 Technical Report - Synthesis of Information on the Benthos of SEA6 Clyde Sea Area

This report is a contribution to the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA6) conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry (now Department of Energy and Climate Change). This report provides a synthesis of current knowledge of the benthic communities and seabed habitats in the Clyde Sea, which abuts the northern end of the SEA6 area. The Clyde Sea is a fjordic system consisting of drowned, glacially over-deepened, valleys separated by sills. The southern limit of the area, and the ultimate sill for the Clyde Sea lochs, is formed by a broad sill termed the Great Plateau. The Great Plateau is predominantly less than 50 m deep and is overlooked by the volcanic plug of Ailsa Craig. 

The report is presented in the context of the hydrography and sedimentology of the area. The focus is on dominant species and broad descriptions of community types (biotopes). It also reviews existing major human activities in the area that are currently affecting the benthos.

Tags: Geology, Habitats and biotopes, Species distribution
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)
2003 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA4 Technical report - Continental shelf seabed geology and processes (north UKCS)

This report is a contribution to the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA4) conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry  (now Department of Energy and Climate Change). The report is a summary of published data and interpretations describes the surficial seabed geology and geological processes affecting the continental shelf part of the SEA4 area, lying in water depths of less than 200 m. Roughly half of the SEA4 area lies in these water depths.

The report reviews the seabed geomorphology, near-bottom currents, types of rock outcrop, variations in the texture of the unconsolidated sediments, the variety and distributions of seabed bedforms and selected aspects of the inorganic geochemistry of the sediments. Variations in the seabed geology have a major influence on the organisms that live on the bottom, thus are important to understanding the modern seabed habitat. The modern seabed environment now largely reflects the effects of reworking by near-bottom currents on the topography and the sediments that originated during the glaciations.

Tags: Geology
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)
2004 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA5 Braer macrofauna data report, ERT 1109 (North Sea)

This report is a contribution to the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA5) conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry  (now Department of Energy and Climate Change). Macrofuanal analysis was undertaken on 61 seabed samples from 13 locations to the southwest of Shetland that were contaminated by oil from the Braer tanker spill. The data report presents the resulting species list and abundance data, together with biomass data and the size measurements of selected taxa.

Tags: Species distribution
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)
2003 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA5 RV Jean Charcot Braer Operations report (North Sea)

As part of the Department of Trade and Industry's (now Department of Energy and Climate Change) Strategic Environmental Assessment 5 (SEA5) a geophysical survey was undertaken on the survey vessel R/V Jean Charcot. The geophysical survey comprised the first phase of a scientific research project devoted to acquiring information about specific aspects of the North Sea Environment and its seafloor habitats. The geophysical survey was required to provide high resolution maps of the seafloor in SEA 5 areas of interest. Swath  bathymetry, side scan sonar and shallow geophysical reflection data were acquired as part of the geophysical survey. No seabed samples were collected.

Tags: Geology, Habitats and biotopes
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)
2004 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA5 Analysis - Particle size and organic matter (North Sea)

This report is a contribution to the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA5) conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry (now Department of Energy and Climate Change). This report describes the results of particle size and organic content analysis on samples obtained during the 'Biology' Leg of the SEA5 programme (RV Jean Charcot, September 17th - October 8th 2003; Outer Moray Firth and Northern North Sea). 216 samples sediment samples where analysed for  particle size distribution and organic content. Standard geological methods were used to derive the following: percent total carbon, percent nitrogen, percent carbonate, percent organic material, particle size distribution and mud:sand:gravel ratio. Data are summarised within an Excel spreadsheet.

Tags: Geology
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)
2004 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA5 Seabed and superficial geology and processes, BGS Report CR/04/064N (North Sea)

This report is a contribution to the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA5) conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry  (now Department of Energy and Climate Change). This report reviews published and newly-acquired seabed geological data in an area of 78,000 square kilometres extending from the coast to more than 200 m water depth to the east of the British Isles. While it can be argued that the modern environment is a product of past environmental conditions, the basis for the review is also that our understanding of the modern environment can be significantly improved if new techniques, data and ideas are applied to a revision of the existing research knowledge.

The purpose of the review is to place the characteristics of the seabed features that were surveyed by the DTI in 2003, and the processes forming them, into an improved understanding of their historical, local and regional context. In this way a strong element of the review is to include the results from exploration and discovery. The survey data included multibeam, sidescan sonar, seismic-reflection profiles, sea floor photographs and samples.

Tags: Geology
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)
2004 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA5 Sediment hydrocarbon analysis of seabed sediments collected in North of Scotland, August - October 2003

As part of the UK Department of Trade and Industry's (now Department of Energy and Climate Change) ongoing sectorial Strategic Environmental Assessment a seabed survey programme (SEA5) was undertaken between August and early October 2003 for the UKCS areas lying between Scotland and Orkney and Shetland. This report summarises the sediment total hydrocarbon and aromatic data generated from the analyses of selected samples from the study areas detailed: Fair Isle - 46 to 198m water depth; Outer Moray Firth A - 61 to 171m; Outer Moray Firth B - 57 to 100m; Sandy Riddle - 30 to 70m; Smith Bank - 39m; Southern Trench - 76 to 252m.

Tags: Geology
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)
2004 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA5 Technical Report - Archaeology (North Sea)

This report is a contribution to the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA5) conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry (now Department of Energy and Climate Change). Prehistoric submarine archaeological remains back to a date of about 12,000 years ago, Palaeolithic, Mesolithic and Neolithic, could occur with low probability anywhere in the SEA5 area between the northern mainland coast and the eastern boundary of SEA5. This report presents an overview of known and likely areas with prehistoric archaeological remains, with mapped indications of relative likelihood of the presence of remains (sensitivity mapping) and with hotspots identified. The existence and possible survival of prehistoric sites is complicated by the rapid and continuing uplift of the east coast of Scotland and the immediately adjacent shelf in the Moray Firth, the fact that ice sheet covered part of the seabed obliterating most artefacts earlier than about 20,000 years BP, and that the seabed towards the median line has subsided, and was associated with extensive sea-water lakes and floating sea ice during the glacial maximum.

Tags: Production and industrial facilities
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)
2004 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA5 Technical Report - Benthos (North Sea)

This report is a contribution to the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA5) conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry (now Department of Energy and Climate Change). The purpose of this report is to present an up-to-date synthesis of current information on the benthic environment and the benthic communities and associations in the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) region 5 and, additionally, to highlight areas considered to be particularly vulnerable to anthropogenic influences. The synthesis has been prepared from the information available on seabed habitats, species and communities to the east of Orkney and Shetland and extending down the east coast of Scotland. The area includes the major east coast features, the Moray Firth, the Firth of Forth, and the Tay estuary, and the inner Firths of Dornoch, Cromarty and Inverness, the Ythan Estuary and the Montrose basin.

Tags: Habitats and biotopes, Species distribution
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)
2004 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA5 Technical Report - Cephalopods (North Sea)

This report is a contribution to the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA5) conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry (now Department of Energy and Climate Change). Cephalopods are short-lived molluscs, characterised by rapid growth rates, and are important predators and prey in oceanic and neritic environments. They can range in size from 1.5 cm in pygmy squid (Sepiolidae) to 20 m in giant squid (Architheutidae). Cephalopods exhibit the highest degree of development in invertebrate nervous systems, expressed through complex behaviour patterns such as the ability to learn and the display of complex colour changes. In contrast to other molluscs, most cephalopods lack an external shell, are highly mobile as adults and occupy similar ecological niches to predatory fish. This report focuses mainly on the species of fishery importance: the loliginid squid Loligo forbesi and the ommastrephid squid Todarodes sagittatus and Todaropsis eblanae together with the octopus Eledone cirrhosa. Brief accounts of other commonly occurring cephalopod species are also provided.

Tags: Species distribution
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)
2004 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA5 Technical Report - Conservation (North Sea)

This report is a contribution to the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA5) conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry (now Department of Energy and Climate Change). An integral element of any environmental assessment for offshore oil and gas exploration, and for possible nearshore renewable energy proposals, involves a review of potential sites of conservational importance within the region of interest. For the purpose of SEA 5, this is especially important given the scale of the area in question and the fact that it includes the coastal zone which is known to support a large number of conservation sites.

The SEA 5 area displays a wide variety of habitat types such as coastal cliffs, rock platforms, beaches and dunes. The area also includes major estuaries such as the Tay and the Forth. Some of these habitats are rare in a national and/or international context, and many support important numbers of bird colonies, seals and, in the Moray Firth, dolphins.

This report identifies and locates coastal and nearshore sites within the SEA 5 area which are protected by international, national and local conservation designations as well as describing the sites and reasons for their protected status. The coastal conservation sites are listed according to whether they are of international, national or local importance.

Tags: Protected sites Sea regions
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)
2004 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA5 Technical Report - Socio-economics

This report is a contribution to the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA5) conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry (now Department of Energy and Climate Change). This report assesses the socio-economic implications of licensing the SEA 5 area and sets out the results in relation to: oil and gas production, and reserves; capital, operating and decommissioning expenditure; employment; tax revenue; social impacts.

The Department of Trade and Industry provided scenarios of possible exploration and development activity in the area and these scenarios were converted into optimistic and pessimistic scenarios. They were then used to produce forecasts of: oil and gas production; oil and gas reserves; expenditure; employment; and tax revenues. The implications for existing facilities in the area are discussed and the potential social impacts.

Tags: Energy resources, Production and industrial facilities
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)
2004 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA5 Technical Report - Shellfish and fisheries (Northern North Sea)

This report is a contribution to the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA5) conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry (now Department of Energy and Climate Change). The SEA5 review differs from previous assessments in that the zone includes a large coastal fringe, along the whole east coast of Scotland and the Northern Isles, and contains a diverse range of habitats, from inter-tidal rocky shores and sandy beaches, to the shallow sub-littoral and deepwater mud basins offshore. These habitats support a wide range of invertebrate resources, of which six species of crustacean, four species of bivalve mollusc and two species of gastropod mollusc form the basis of a thriving shellfish fishing industry in Scotland.

The landings are dominated by the Norway lobster, Nephrops norvegicus which occurs in four main areas, one of which, the Fladen ground, is in close proximity to mature oil fields. The fishery for this species in the North Sea is likely to increase, with diversion of effort from the demersal fisheries for cod and other whitefish.

Much of this expansion should take place at Fladen where the stock is at present under-exploited. It is likely, however, that trawl gear used in the Norway lobster (and pink shrimp) fisheries will be required to be more selective in order to reduce the by-catch of demersal fish, especially cod, and the wastage through discarding of under-sized fish.

Relevant aspects of the biology of each species are described, including habitat preference, distribution, feeding, life-cycle, reproduction and spawning. Details are given about the fishing methods used, assessments of the state of stocks, and the management regime and legislation currently used to control each fishery.

Tags: Species distribution
Organization: British Geological Survey (BGS)