As part of the Department of Trade and Industry's (now Department of Energy and Climate Change) Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA7 an environmental survey was carried out from the SV Kommandor Jack. The aim of the survey was to acquire seabed samples for biological, physical and chemical analysis together with video and digital stills photography to ground truth the geophysical data and enable a general characterisation of seafloor habitats and community types present within the SEA7 area. The area sampled included Anton Dohrn Seamount, Rockall Bank, Hatton Bank, George Bligh Bank and Rosemary Bank. This report provides a log of the field sampling work undertaken for SEA7, in particular the biological, physical and chemical sampling.

This report pertains to samples collected for the UK Department of Trade and Industry (now Department of Energy and Climate Change) as part of Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA1 (White Zone) from west of the Shetland Islands by Geotek Ltd from the RRS Charles Darwin during the summer of 2000. This report is the product of statistical analyses on grain size data of 109 seabed samples.

This report is a contribution to the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA7) conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry (now Department of Energy and Climate Change). Investigations of the hydrocarbon prospectivity and earthquake activity include the whole of SEA7 but in this report investigations of the sea-bed sediments are restricted to the Hebrides Shelf, Rockall Trough and east Rockall Bank. On the Hebrides Shelf, Hebrides Slope, east Rockall Bank and in the deep-water Rockall Trough the modern sea-bed sediments are mainly composed of mixtures of former glacial deposits and grains of modern interglacial biogenic carbonate shell. Former glacial deposits and modern biogenic carbonate are now mainly mixed and transported by wave-orbital currents and residual currents on Rockall Bank and by combinations of wave-orbital currents, tidal currents and residual currents on the Hebrides Shelf and upper Hebrides Slope. Below approximately 300 metres water depth in the Rockall Trough the sea-bed sediments are mainly transported by circulating deep-water residual currents.

This report is the product of the laboratory analyses carried out on sediments collected on the MV Kommandor Jack during the summer or 2001 as part of Department of Trade and Industry's (now Department of Energy and Climate Change) Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA2. The results of the analyses include tables and curves from the samples collected from the southern North Sea, the associated distribution curves, results of the analyses of the fine-grained samples collected from the northern North Sea, and the results of the Loss on Ignition analysis. An Excel data file is also available.

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.

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.

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.

As part of the Department of Trade and Industry's (now Department of Energy and Climate Change) 1999 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA1 (White Zone) Environmental Survey: Seabed survey of the deep-waters to the north and west of Scotland. The aims were to : Complete TOBI sidescan sonar survey of the "White Zone" begun on RRS Charles Darwin cruise 119C leg A; To carry out photographic surveys of the "White Zone" to ground truth the sidescan sonar imagery and provide an assessment of the seabed fauna; To carry out seabed sampling to further ground truth the sidescan sonar imagery and generate samples for the future analysis of selected environmental parameters (hydrocarbons, elements, particle size). 39 samples were collected. Raw TOBI Bathymetry - includes sidescan sonar, sub-bottom profiler and magnetometer data and Mosaiced TOBI sidescan imagery are available. The survey report is also available. The preliminary report describes the data collection and interpretation carried out by Southampton Oceanography Centre in the summer of 1999 on behalf of the DTI. The areas surveyed were in unlicensed parts of the UKCS NW of Scotland, and the purpose of the work was to obtain regional environmental information. The work was carried out in two survey legs, Leg A was a regional side-scan sonar survey, whilst leg B was a seafloor survey of targets selected from the results of leg 1. This report is presented in 4 sections: Section 1 - Cruise report for Leg A; Section 2 - Cruise report for Leg B; Section 3 - Regional environmental interpretation from side-scan sonar and camera data; Section 4 - Initial environmental assessment.

Seabed sampling with video and digital stills photography; Moray Firth, Southern Trench, Sandy Riddle, Pobie Bank, Braer Study Area, Fair Isle, Papa and Turbot Banks, Smith Bank and JONSIS Transect. This report forms the second of two reports relating to 2 research cruises undertaken on behalf of the Department of Trade and Industry (now Department of Energy and Climate Change) during the Strategic Environmental Assessment 5 (SEA5). Data were collected by the RV Kommandor Jack during the period September 17th - October, 8th, 2003. The report describes the collection of a variety of benthic sediment samples for the analysis of particle size, hydrocarbon and heavy metal content, and benthic fauna composition. These were collected in order to enable groundtruthing and interpretation of the various geophysical data-sets collected during the first cruise. In addition, marine video surveying techniques were used to photograph parts of the seabed.

This report contains heavy metal concentrations (As, Ba, Cr, Cu, Cd, Fe, Hg, Pb, Mn, Ni, Sr, V and Zn) and sedimentological characteristics (particle-size analysis) which were determined in respectively 61 and 68 samples for the Atlantic margin Department of Trade and Industry's (now Department of Energy and Climate Change) Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA4) . A spreadsheet of data is available.