The future of Geoconservation

As part of an ALSF-funded project "Making the most of Geodiversity in Aggregate Quarries", your Geology Trust is about to publish a Local Geodiversity Action Plan (LGAP). An LGAP is a document, similar to a Biodiversity Action Plan, underpinning all work relating to geodiversity within a local region and also providing an opportunity to influence planning and policy at county level.

We want to set an example, to establish a working protocol that takes into account all interests for the benefit of geodiversity and geoconservation because geology is not solid as a rock, because sites disappear everyday through erosion, landfill, development, neglect....

Our approach to the LGAP is about improving geodiversity, actively making things better. NE Yorkshire Geology Trusts is an independent, not-for-profit organisation which for the last 8 years has been active in geoconservation, both protecting our rich geodiversity and also sharing it with as wide an audience as possible.

With the announcement in January that DEFRA's Aggregate Levy Sustainability Fund (ALSF) is to be scrapped at the end of March 2011 come serious concerns as to the future of geocnservation. The ALSF was the only source of funding dedicated to geoconservation, we will feel its loss very dearly. We are in receipt of no core funding, as you know, and yet our local presence and expertise should be an asset in these times of localism.

Whatever future there is in store for geoconservation, NE Yorkshire Geology Trust wants to influence it and make sure our pragmatic and professional approach benefits and improves the state of geoconservation at national level.
The Fascinating Geology behind Oil Discoveries  

Courtesy of Shell UK Ltd

Courtesy of Shell UK Ltd

On the 16th September, NE Yorkshire Geology Trust invites you to Whitby Pannett Park Museum for a lecture by Dr Michael Naylor on the fascinating geology of oil discoveries. It will take place in the Normanby Room from 7 to 8pm.

Dr Mike Naylor worked for Shell for 31 years in oil and gas exploration and new business development. He began his career as a research scientist with Shell after gaining M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in geology from the University of Cambridge. His most recent position was Vice President Technical, Global Exploration for Shell, in which he was responsible for technology, technical standards and project assurance. This gave him a unique oversight of Shell's global exploration activities. Prior to this he held a series of management and geoscientist positions, in Kazakhstan, the Netherlands, Oman and Egypt.

This presentation will take a look at the fascinating geological plays associated with some of the giant oil and gas discoveries of the last 50 years.

On a whirlwind global tour, we will visit major fields in the North Sea, the Gulf of Mexico, the Niger Delta and the Caspian Sea, representing depositional environments as diverse as marine sand bars, desert sand dunes, deep-sea turbidite fans and tropical carbonate reefs.

We will see that fundamental geological scientific studies and the application of technology enabled the explorer to determine that all the key ingredients – source rock, reservoir, seal and trap – were present before drilling. This was coupled with the persistence and innovation by the engineers, who drilled and developed these significant contributors to the global energy supply.

Dr Naylor's talk will be illustrated by amazing graphics and will give us a whistle-stop tour of oil-gas exploration in the last 50 years. This is a wonderful opportunity to find out about the complex business of exploration from a specialist geoscientist. We hope you will take advantage of this unique event and join your local Geology Trust in welcoming Dr Mike Naylor to Yorkshire.

The Lecture will take place in the Normanby Room of the Whitby Pannett Park Museum. The entrance fee is £2 per person. Members of North East Yorkshire Geology Trust benefit with free entrance as part of their yearly membership of £10, valid from April to March.

 

This summer NE Yorkshire Geology Trust will be presenting three new trails in the Secrets in the Landscape series. Two of the trails will be based in the Rosedale area and form part with a Earth Heritage booklet of our Vales and Dales project funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund.

The third trail is in Hovingham and Slingsby and is part of our Quarry Project supported by the Aggregates Levy Sustainability Fund administered by Natural England.At the Rosedale show

This spring and new financial year sees us busy with our brand new events programme, the surveying of sites, creating new trails and trail testing them as well as forming partnerships and collaborating with organisations for the benefit of geoconservation and the protection of our wonderful geology and geodiversity.

We’ll keep you informed of further developments and hope to see you at our public events in May for Yorkshire Geology Month and all year round like at the Rosedale Show on August 21st.