Digital GIS mineral planning permission polygons from 1947 to 1985 as digitised from the Ministry of Housing and Local Government Planning Permission Maps and Cards (see associated metadata for MHLG Maps, Cards and Scanned Maps ). Data digitised included all planning permissions granted, withdrawn and refused for local authority areas for all of England. Currently 32,000 separate planning permission polygons have been captured from the maps and attributed using the associated card index.

A card index storing supplementary information regarding name, operator, dates and commodity worked for each planning permission boundary recorded (drawn) on the Ministry of Housing and Local Government (MHLG) Mineral Planning Permissions Maps (see associated metadata). Information on the cards has been used to attribute the Ministry of Housing and Local Government (MHLG) Mineral Planning Permission Polygons (see associated metadata for MHLG Planning Permission Polygons).

This dataset provides a digital spatial representation of the Mineral Planning Authorities (MPAs) across the United Kingdom. Each polygon represents an administrative area responsible for mineral planning and regulation and is linked to the relevant onshore mineral resource maps and accompanying reports for that area. The Mineral Planning Authority areas broadly align with the administrative units used in the preparation of BGS mineral resource maps. In England and parts of South Wales, these maps were produced following a commission to BGS by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (now the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government) through the research project Mineral resource information in support of national, regional and local planning. This work was completed in 2006 and resulted in a series of digitally generated mineral resource maps at a scale of 1:100 000, covering administrative areas across England and parts of South Wales. In Scotland, BGS was awarded funding from the Scottish Government Aggregates Levy Fund in 2007 to develop a comprehensive and accessible mineral resource information base for 18 local authorities within the Central Belt of Scotland. This work was co-funded through the BGS Sustainable Mineral Solutions project and was completed in March 2008. The project outputs included a guide to minerals information for the Central Belt and a series of digitally generated mineral resource maps at a scale of 1:100 000. In Wales, BGS was awarded funding from the Welsh Government-administered Aggregates Levy Sustainability Fund for Wales in 2009 to develop a comprehensive mineral resource information base covering Wales. The project was co-funded through the BGS Sustainable Mineral Solutions team, part of the Minerals and Waste Science Programme, and was led from the BGS Cardiff office. This work was completed in July 2010 and produced a series of six digitally generated mineral resource maps at a scale of 1:100 000, together with supporting mineral resource information for Wales. A primary objective of this work was to provide baseline mineral resource information in a consistent, updateable format to support mineral planning, including use in mineral development plan documents and regional spatial strategies. This Mineral Planning Authority spatial layer provides a framework for accessing these mineral resource maps and reports, supporting mineral planning, land-use decision making and resource management.

PROJECT DETAILS ONLY - NO DATA. In the north of England, the dissolution of gypsum by groundwater is responsible for many subsidence features where gypsum beds lie within 100m of the ground surface. The subsidence hazard not only threatens housing and other infrastructure, but also requires expensive special precautions for new construction and potentially may sterilize land that would otherwise be suitable for development. Site investigation by borehole drilling is inadequate for identifying cavities in the gypsum beds because a borehole that proves solid gypsum may have missed a cavity by less than one metre. A surface surveying technique that gives areal coverage is required to detect cavities, which may subsequently be proved by targeted drilling. Seismic reflection is the only viable geophysical technique for detecting gypsum dissolution cavities in the depth range of interest (30-120m). In this project, the seismic reflection method will be applied to the detection of gypsum dissolution cavities by acquiring data for a range of near-surface conditions in the areas around Darlington and Ripon. Different acquisition parameters and processing techniques will be compared and evaluated to determine an appropriate strategy for future applications of the seismic reflection method in site investigation. The method is potentially applicable for detection of cavities elsewhere, e.g. salt dissolution cavities (Cheshire), and abandoned mineworkings in coalfield areas at comparable depths.

PROJECT DETAILS ONLY - NO DATA. Vegetation plays an important role in landscapes that are shaped by wind-driven (aeolian) sand transport, such as coastal dunes and semi-arid regions. We have a good knowledge of how and why different types of desert dunes and dune fields form without the presence of vegetation, but our understanding of the effects of vegetation in the formation of coastal foredunes, parabolic dunes, blowouts, and nebkha's (shrub hummocks) is limited to descriptive observations and reasoning. This is especially true for vegetated dune fields on a landscape scale, and the effects of various plant species on the evolution and dynamics of such environments are not quantified. This research project aims to develop a computer simulation model based on moving around slabs of sand across a grid of cells that represents a landscape surface including varying amounts of vegetation in each cell. These movements are controlled by a set of simple rules that dictate interactions between the existing surface, the vegetation in each cell, and the propagation of the sand slabs. This allows simulating the evolution of aeolian landscapes through self-organisation into different types of dune fields without actually modelling the complex airflow dynamics and sand transport patterns. Simulations will be compared with our current descriptive understanding of vegetated aeolian landscape development to ensure that the model generates realistic results. The model is then used to systematically investigate exactly how and why various kinds of plant species and vegetation patterns influence the dynamics of dune development in aeolian environments.

The datastore for the BGS digital field data capture system contains databases that have been collected by field geologists and geoscientists using the MIDAS Tablet PCs. The databases replicate (in simple terms) the information and field observations that used to be recorded on paper fieldslips, notebooks and cameras. Depending on what is being mapped, each database can hold data from a complete series of field seasons, and contains points, lines, polygons, map face notes, sketches, photographs, tagged text, and structured data such as measurements and descriptions constrained by dictionaries and standards. Every item collected in the field using this system is attributed with a Unique User ID (UUID) that is constructed using the geologists ID and the date and time (to the second), along with a grid reference aided by a built-in EGNOS (European Geostationary Navigation Overlay Service) -enabled GPS (Global Positioning System). The store contains data collected across the UK and overseas. The scale varies depending on the project. MIDAS was first used in 2006 and each year more field teams are using it to replace pencil and paper records. The data are verified in this fully-relational datastore and transferred from here into the appropriate corporate databases for further manipulation.

PROJECT DETAILS ONLY - NO DATA. Opportunities to sample relatively undisturbed deep subsurface microbial communities rarely arise. This outline for an Urgency proposal relates to one such rare opportunity to sample a deep hot, saline aquifer in Eastgate, Weardale, and conduct microbiological and geochemical analyses on the samples. This will provide both fundamental data on the microbiota of a rarely explored environment and geochemical data that will provide clues to the source of the hot water and hence other potential areas for geothermal energy recovery, which could be contribute to the UK's renewable energy portfolio. Analysis of hydrogen and oxygen isotopes will be used to identify the source of the deep groundwater, chemical analysis will define the geochemical environment and process measurements coupled with analysis of the bacterial and archaeal communities will provide information on what supports the deep biosphere in this deep, hot saline aquifer.

The (GEBCO) aims to provide the most authoritative, publicly available bathymetry datasets for the world's oceans. Coastline dataset to support the General Bathymetric Chart of the Oceans.

A collection of aerial photographs providing national coverage supplied to BGS by Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland (RCAHMS). The aerial photos bought by BGS were taken during a two year period from 1988-89 and were bought by BGS for individual mapping projects. The photos are a copy of the originals held by the RCAHMS. Since 1976, RCAHMS has undertaken an annual programme of aerial survey, recording archaeological sites, monuments and buildings throughout Scotland. All RCAHMS data is crown copyright. The photos are for internal BGS use but external users are welcome to view them at BGS, an appointment must be made first. An index is provided on the Geoscience Data Index (GDI).

This dataset contains daily monthly average N80 Gaussian gridded, potential vorticity level, analysis timestep parameters from the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) Re-Analysis (ERA) 40 program from January 1958 to December 2001. ERA-40 followed on from the ERA-15 re-analysis project. Access limited to UK based academic researchers only. These data are GRIB formatted.