
Robin Francis GraysonIndependent Consultant · Manchester
Robin Francis Grayson
BSc in Zoology, BSc in Geology & MSc in Geology
About
52
Publications
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Introduction
Robin is a polymath with interests spanning:
ECOLOGY: EIA & ESIA; herpetology (especially Triturus), freshwater invertebrates (cladocerans; Hydra, beetles etc.); pond ecology & pondscapes; urban ecology; urban forests, air quality; groundwater; soda lakes, permafrost, aufeis (naleds), urban heat islands;
GEOLOGY: paleontology; paleoecology; deep geothermal; geology of Manchester and NW England; geology of Kabul Block and Hindu Kush; transpressive orogens, onshore oil/gas & fracking; alluvial gold; uranium, fluorspar; lapis lazuli; talc, steatite; jade; shungite, mercury; brick clays etc.
ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT: SME advisory services, business incubators, microenterprises, mono-cities, mineral rushes (gold, talc, jade, coal etc.); multiculturalism, urban regeneration; community politics.
Publications
Publications (52)
The genesis of natural zeolite in Mongolia is attributable to the late Mesozoic tectonic-magmatism activity in East Mongolia - Dornod. The numerous volcanoes formed during this activation process were surrounded by Cretaceous depressions with mineralized waters (Na+, K+, Ca+, Мg+, Al+, H+, SO42-, CO32- ,Cl-, O2- etc.). The huge amount of ash (glass...
ABSTRACT
Using vintage seismic data is a novel approach in railway construction which has potential to contribute significantly in route optioneering and ground hazard mitigation. The HS2 high speed railway project is a major transport project, well advanced in its planning. Using seismic and other sources, a number of timely comments are made on a...
This UPDATED report presents insights into the stratigraphy, tectonic history and hydrocarbon resource potential of Mississippian (Lower Carboniferous) strata in the in the Bowland Megabasin of NorthWest England. The Megabasin holds exceptionally thick shale, excellent both as source rocks for hydrocarbons and as seals for conventional oil and gas...
This report presents insights into the stratigraphy, tectonic history and hydrocarbon resource potential of Mississippian (Lower Carboniferous) strata in the in the Bowland Megabasin of North-West England. The Megabasin holds exceptionally thick shale, excellent both as source rocks for hydrocarbons and as seals for conventional oil and gas resourc...
A swarm of small earthquakes raised concerns among local communities in Surrey and was also felt at London Gatwick Airport. Known as “the Newdigate earthquakes sequence” the swarm is the subject of ongoing monitoring by the British Geological Survey (BGS).
A group of four leading geologists have called for a moratorium on oil and gas drilling in...
Pressure by oil and gas companies, freed themselves from having to reveal information in the USA about releases of toxic hydrogen sulphide from fracking. Only for the last five years have they been obliged to do so (Earthworks 2011). This culture of secrecy about H2S has been imported into the ongoing fracking rush in West Lancashire. Here the nasc...
Too much secrecy surrounding the UK’s nascent fracking industry has inevitably led to deep distrust by the affected communities. Distrust not only about the investors’ intentions but also about the neutrality of the British Geological Survey who are increasingly regarded as promotors of fracking rather that a font of impartial advice (Ruth Hayhurst...
The Manchester Marl is claimed to be a seal capable of preventing leakage of toxic frack fluids to the surface. This claim is now open to serious challenge in the Fylde region of Lancashire in North-West England. Ten geological risks are presented, none of which have so far been satisfactorily addressed by proponents of fracking or by the governmen...
A major play for fracked gas is the current focus of intensive onshore exploration in North-West England.
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The author is concerned about several issues, in particular the rapidly increasing political risk to investors in the wake of the Liberal Democratic Party pledging to oppose fracking, leaving the minority Conservative Government isolated as...
The hot topic of Student Loans is a firestorm led by the United States and England. As an indicator of worse to come, household debt due to student loans now exceeds debts due to credit cards in the USA and UK. Yet as a result many Universities are booming. But as one observer noted, “How much ivory do these towers need?”
A review is presented of...
This investigation illustrates the cladding of tower blocks in the city of Manchester UK, by means of Google Earth (GE). GE-Pro 3D proved to a rapid and effective means of pinpointing locations of 76 tower blocks in Manchester. Clicking to GE-Pro historical views confirmed 75 were built prior to 2000, the sole exception being the Village-135 develo...
This investigation illustrates the diversity of tower blocks in Manchester. 3D Google Earth Pro proved to be a rapid and effective means of pinpointing locations of 70 tower blocks in Manchester. Images of 54 tower blocks are presented in the report. Images illustrated not only the number of storeys but also showed in detail each of the vertical wa...
This report presents findings of a rapid study commissioned by John Bridges, the Liberal Democrat candidate for Manchester Central in the upcoming UK General Election. The study documents the air pollution crisis in Manchester city centre:
1: For more than seven years, the annual average NO2 levels in the Oxford Road corridor have exceeded the UK...
1: John Leech, the Liberal Democrat candidate for Manchester Withington in the General Election on 8th June 2017, commissioned the present report to investigate the ‘Air Pollution Crisis for Manchester Undergraduates’ covering Manchester City Centre, Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester University and the Oxford Road – Wilmslow Road corri...
1: Air Pollution is a NATIONAL HEALTH EMERGENCY with Manchester as a serious hotspot.
2: It is a draw between Manchester City and Manchester United in terms of their score for levels of NO2 pollution outside their stadiums both a little below an annual average of 35 micrograms of toxic NO2/m3 of air indicated by proximity to the invisible border of...
1: Air Pollution is a NATIONAL HEALTH EMERGENCY with Manchester as a serious hotspot.
2: Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU), Manchester City Centre and Hulme community are criss-crossed by networks of Street Canyons that trap NO2 pollutants.
3: MMU and the city centre also endure NO2 from the elevated Mancunian Way Motorway.
4: MMU also endur...
Chapter One introduces the placer gold miner to Best Available Techniques (BAT) that maximises profits by minimising impacts which maximises efficiency.
Unfortunately BAT is implicitly BATNEEC (BAT Not Exceeding Excessive Cost) without regard to the scale of mining or size of companies. The novel term BATTE is introduced (BAT Tailored for Entities)...
ABSTRACT: PART ONE: SUNBURSTS MAKE VISIBLE THE INVISIBLE AQMA (NO2 Air Quality Management Area)
At the request of the former Member of Parliament John Leech, now the sole opposition councillor on Manchester City Council, a team of Liberal Democrats investigated how to make visible “at a glance” places in the city where toxic levels of invisible nit...
Large gold dredges have had a bad press for 150 years due total destruction of wetlands and leaving areas derelict. However satellite images prove that where land site values are high then the tailings are rehabilitated as Best Available Techniques BAT. Conversely where land site values are low then the tailings are left derelict as Worst Available...
We present evidence for exceptionally high levels of uranium, radon and fluoride in Mongolia that pose significant risks to human health. Thermo-electric power stations burn uraniferous coals with high ash content to produce electricity and provide district heating for Ulaanbaatar - the world's coldest capital city. Enormous quantities of uranifero...
Explanation is sought for the high uranium levels in Ulaanbaatar’s ash dumps, groundwater, construction materials and vegetation, and the high radon level in the city’s drinking water. Combustion of uranium-bearing coals is a cause, but natural sources of uranium may also be factors. Mongolian coals are important sinks for elemental enrichment by u...
Using Google Earth imagery, the North Afghan Orogen was identified as an intraplate intracontinental orogen by plotting a regional network of steep dip belts for thousands of kilometers across the North Afghan Platform as surrogates for a orogen-wide network of transpressive faults that delineated rigid blocks and triggered powerful pop-up anticlin...
A novel windlass-shaft safety system for bulk sampling and artisanal mining, invented by the author. The system was designed in Mongolia, making full use of a pair of winterized Mongolian gers (”yurta”). Both gers have solar panels to charge 12-volt car batteries for charging headlights, internal lighting, mobiles, walkie-talkies and kettles. The f...
Canyons of Ghor – catastrophic cousins of Bamiyan’s Band-e Amir lakes. Author: Robin Grayson Environmental Adviser, Ministry of Mines of Afghanistan. Email address: washplant@rocketmail.com The sapphire-blue waters of the Band-e Amir Lakes and their biogenic reefs dams are natural wonders and a World Heritage Site. This paper describes a cluster of...
Comprehensive training manual on all aspects of placer exploration mining, processing and rehabilitation, particularly for alluvial gold.
The paper illustrates the impact of large bucket-line gold dredges. Many trunk valleys in NE China, Siberia and the Russian Far East are extensively damaged, and the damage is spreading In their wake, the gold dredges leave arcs of dumped gravel (‘bananas’) stacked against one another as long ribbed mounds (‘crocodiles’). Diagnostic of large bucket...
While glaciers, ice sheets and grab the headlines, naled ice shields remain “out in the cold”.
The paper highlights the large number of naled ice shields in Asia, and draws attention to their value as a buffer to Climate Change. The author first trawled the internet on the topic of naleds, and presents a short bibliography with some analysis.
Next,...
Remote sensing paper tracking the extent and nature of fluorspar mining in Mongolia.
The purpose of the study is to assist the reader to gain a better understanding of Mongolia's Coal Rush and to draw attention to lessons that can be learned from China’s coal industry. To achieve this, we searched for activities in northern China to serve as models – good and bad – to help guide Mongolia in managing its spate of new coal mines. The...
major remote sensing paper showing fundamental structural changes to the border regions between China and Mongolia.
Bucket-line gold dredges have existed for more than a century and in North America and Australia and are preserved as relics. Yet such dredges are still active in large parts of the world.
The study shows bucket-line gold dredges are still being manufactured and launched in Siberia, Mongolia and China. Rather than being out-dated technology the r...
Pen balls look set to invigorate research into gravitation settling and make experiments affordable on particles as dense as native gold. For centuries, gold miners have preferred sluices to catch placer gold. In spite of innovations such as centrifuges, they prefer the sluice-cheap to make, easy to use and boasting an un-rivalled concentration rat...
The study considers the poverty-driven ‘People’s Gold Rush’ that caught Mongolia by surprise. Driven by poverty and desperation, over 100,000 people resorted to gold mining with little more than hand tools. Known as ‘the ninjas’, Mongolia’s artisanal and small scale miners (ASM) arose so suddenly that they are informal and illegal, with no legal fr...
The study sets out to identify methods capable now, or in the near future, of recovering gold traditionally lost by placer gold mines and artisanal miners, but without resorting to dangerous mercury or controversial cyanide. The study tracks the rise and fall of gold recovery systems across the world. The study clarifies the meaning of 'fine gold',...
The article sets out to clarify the special character of a lotok and why it remains so popular among geologists, mining engineers and placer mining companies inside the former Soviet Union and Mongolia, and why the lotok has been so comprehensively rejected by nearly all of Mongolia's artisanal miners. The operation of the lotok is described and il...
The article sets out to clarify the special character of the North American gold pan and why it remains so popular – in spite of widespread dissatisfaction and many modifications and innovations. The North American pan is distinctive in being circular with a flattish floor ringed by an outwardly sloping wall. Its identity is confused by over-use of...
The article is a Short Note to draw attention to buckets having a useful role in gold recovery. The term 'bucketing' is proposed to ensure the distinctive nature of operating a bucket is not smothered by the term 'panning'. The term 'panning' remains useful in colloquial English to cover all manner of hand-driven gravitational gold recovery devices...
Email contacts: (1, 5, 8) emiweb@magicnet.mn (3) bill.murray@murrayharrison.com (4) tumenba@magicnet.mn ABSTRACT This paper presents the results of the first national survey of the dramatic upsurge in artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) in Mongolia, an illegal upsurge that caught the Government, local people, mining industry, media and internati...
This study shows the Lake Baikal watershed has a significant risk of mercury pollution. The threat is from a large technogenic mercury placer in the Boroo River, a tributary of the Selenge-Orkhon river feeding Lake Baikal. Repeated mercury losses have occurred for 100 years from the Boroo Gold Recovery Factory on the bank of the Boroo River. The fa...
The paper presents a critique of the difficulties in determining the presence and abundance of Great Crested Newt. Definitions are proposed for the terms Pond Clusters, Pond Superclusters, Pondways and Pondscapes across North-West England. Maps are presented on a 1-km grid of Greater Manchester County of the presence/absence of Great Crested Newt u...
Carboniferous graptolites are rare in Britain and Ireland, occurring most commonly in Lancashire and Yorkshire, and particularly at a few sites on Pendle Hill. Despite this there is a considerable diversity, and the following are described: Dendrograptus whitewellensis sp. nov., D. rileyi, sp. nov., D. oldhamisp. nov., Dictyonema kittyae sp. nov.,...
This study examined the distribution of ponds in North-west England to provide a regional framework for floral, faunal and landscape studies sufficient to enable the targeting of wildlife recording, conservation strategies and planning measures. The study area consisted of four administrative counties in North-west England: Lancashire, Cheshire, Me...
Our work establishes Greater Manchester County as being of national importance for amphibian breeding sites. The County includes the largest known concentration of Great Crested Newt ponds in the UK, a concentration probably of international importance - in spite of serious losses since World War II and a contraction and dismemberment of its range....
Introduction to the world of microscopy, includes history, taking photos, preparing specimens, making your own microscope.
In the past all records of the semi-terrestrial amphipod Orchestia cavimana were incorrectly reported as Orchestia bottae. We recorded Orchestia cavimana in large colonies under stones and turf in or immediately adjacent to the swash zone of the Bridgewater Canal in Cheshire. Other records for the UK are discussed.
All strata, including “reef” limestones, between the top of the Chatburn Limestone and the base of the Cephalopod Shales are here designated the Clitheroe Limestone Complex. The complex is of C2S1 age and characterized by intricately related bank, flank, inter-bank and other facies, covering a large tract of the Craven basin. C2S1 uplift of the com...
Deep boreholes and up-dated surface geology commonly demonstrate the failure of the 'block and basin' hypothesis to provide an exploration strategy for the Dinantian of northern Britain beyond the area of its inception around the Alston and Askrigg blocks of Northern England.
The search for a better hypothesis requires, as an essential prerequisi...
Questions
Questions (12)
Generations of scientists, including myself, have observed under the microscope the ability of the giant amoeba Hydramoeba hydroxena to devour Hydra alive by extracting one epidermal cell at a time. This routine activity includes extracting solitary nematocyst cells without triggering discharge.
Is this ability related in some way to Hydramoeba hydroxena possessing a solitary large highly active contractile vacuole. For instance could the pressure difference achieved by the contractile vacuole be powerful enough to pop out a single epidermal cell of the prey?
If this is plausible, then perhaps this giant amoeba merits attention to help shed light on how target cells in mammalian tissues might be extracted one at a time.
Hydramoeba hydroxena has a cosmopolitan distribution in the northern hemisphere and is fairly common amidst wild populations of Hydra attenuata, H. oligactis, H. graysoni, H. circumcincta and Chlorohydra viridissima in ponds and clean streams near Manchester and the Lake District in NW England. This amoeba species is easily cultured in the laboratory in the presence of live Hydra prey, in turn fed by live food such as Daphnia.
We have a few excellent examples in the Bowland Basin of North-West England and wonder if they are unique.
I'm trying to put together an article on the Manchester Earthquake Swarm and the oil and gas seismic lines of the 1980s that cut across it. A good photo would make the article better and more interesting for Mancunians who live in the area of the now long-gone swarm but remember it. Cheers! Robin
Lots of papers exist reporting low levels of specific chemicals.
However, what about the collective effect of such high PM2.5 levels?
Some of the Afghan data is aligned with your investigations but some is not. There are sharp differences between different regions and evidence indicates social license to operate is the dominant factor in common.
Humans endure a temporary reduction in performance during transitory increases in air pollution, so does this also occur with other primates, and other mammals in general?
Research indicates professional footballers suffer a temporary reduction in performance during a transitory episode of high outdoor PM10 air pollution, measured as a reduction in the number of passes made during a league match held in a stadium.
Research indicates school students are awarded slightly lower grades in national examinations after sitting a written exam indoors during a transitory episode of higher ambient levels of PM2.5.
Research also indicates undergraduates are awarded slightly lower marks in their final examinations after sitting a written exam indoors in an examination room with internal air quality having higher PM10 levels than students in other examination rooms.
Football stadia are commonly inside cities with high levels of air pollution, especially NO2. In the stadia many players spend 90 minutes of intense physical exertion involving maximum lung activity. Has anyone investigated the impact of air pollution on the performance and health of the players? Thanks.
The Sunburst Lichen Xanthoria parietina can be prolific in air has high levels of ammonia or NOx. In Manchester UK it is closely associated with the Greater Manchester Air Quality Management Area AQMA for NOx, and can be in great abundant on tree trunks and fallen twiglets. In Manchester colonies of this prominent lichen can sometimes be seen on Google Earth in street view. The images show 4 examples, 2 in Mosley Rd in Fallowfield, 1 in Piccadilly Gardens next to an electric tram, and 1 in the middle of the dual carraigeway in Kingsway in Burnage.
Has anyone else seen colonies of the NOx junky Sunburst Lichen on Google Earth? Any comments, ideas welcome! Robin