A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a legislative requirement, GAO provided information on the corrective actions taken by the Army following the deaths of four Ranger students in a 1995 training accident, focusing on the status of: (1) Army Ranger training manning levels required by the fiscal year 1996 National Defense Authorization Act; (2) establishing safety cell organizations required by the act; (3) corrective safety actions instituted after the accident; and (4) inspections of identified safety controls."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on the Federal Aviation Administration's (FAA) efforts to implement the Federal Aviation Reauthorization Act of 1996, focusing on: (1) the status of FAA's efforts to implement the requirement of section 301 of the act mandating that FAA conduct a study and report to Congress on whether aviation security responsibilities should be transferred from the airline carriers to airports or the federal government; (2) the status of FAA's efforts to implement section 302 mandating that FAA certify security screening companies and improve the training and testing of security screeners through the development of performance standards; and (3) issues that could impede FAA's implementation of section 302."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a legislative requirement, GAO provided information on the Department of Defense's (DOD) Future Years Defense Program (FYDP), focusing on: (1) whether savings in DOD's fiscal year (FY) 1999-2003 FYDP were the result of DOD's Defense Reform Initiatives (DRI); (2) the extent to which savings and personnel reductions from competitive sourcing in the 1999-2003 FYDP were based on ongoing or planned studies of functions specifically identified under the Office of Management and Budget Circular A-76, and what percentage of the current costs of performing those functions were included from the projected savings from these studies; and (3) whether DOD components outsourced activities that included inherently governmental functions, without allowing civilian employees to compete under Circular A-76 procedures, or without following the study and notification requirements of 10 U.S.C. 2461."

Rate constants for the aqueous oxidation of N-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA) have been measured in aqueous phosphate-buffered solutions using Dickson-type vessels. The initial NDMA concentrations ranged from 2.5 to 2.8 ppm and reaction temperatures varied from 180 C to 220 C. Quantitation of NDMA was performed by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) using selected ion monitoring (SIM). NDMA loss with concomitant production of nitrite and nitrate confirmed that mineralization of NDMA occurred, and no intermediates amenable to GC-MS were formed during the oxidation experiments. First order reaction rate constants for the loss of NDMA were determined by the integral method and the results are as follows: k{sub 1} = 5.21 x 10{sup -7} s{sup -1} at 180 C, k{sub 1} = 1.14 x 10{sup -6} s{sup -1} at 190 C, k{sub 1} = 2.05 x 10{sup -6} s{sup -1} at 200 C, k{sub 1} = 4.53 x 10{sup -6} s{sup -1} at 210 C and k{sub 1} = 8.81 x 10{sup -6} s{sup -1} at 220 C. The Arrhenius equation for this data is listed below: ln (k) = 20.21 - 15716 (1/T). The activation energy for this process is calculated to be 130.7 {+-} 3.5 kJ/mole. Extrapolating to a temperature of 125 …

This report describes emergency supplemental initiatives for the year 1999. The initiatives include: agriculture, embassy security and counter-terrorism, year 2000 computer conversion, U.S. troops in Bosnia, defense readiness, and other topics.

The purpose of this project was to complete the development of the laser systems and separator systems needed to investigate the potential for the economical separation of high value isotopes used in medical and industrial applications, then demonstrate this separation capability. The project was to focus on the isotopic purification of lead for use as solder in high- end electronics, and on the isotopic enrichment of thallium for medical applications. Ultimately the goal is to demonstrate the economical and technical viability of the technology for lead and thallium and to develop a more general capability for other possible isotope separation missions. Both lead and thallium are usefulapplications in this context because they require- dye lasers, solid- state lasers, and a frequency doubling capability of some of the lasers. This later capability allows access to the wavelength range 250 to 450 mn, with tunable, high- power and high repetition frequency lasers. Until recently, these wavelengths have been largely inaccessible in combination with these other laser characteristics. In addition, up to two new potential laser- isotope separation applications would be conceptually developed through a process of needs analysis and technical feasibility studies. Because of an unanticipated reduction in the size of the …

This report provides a summary of LDRD work completed during 1997 and 1998 to develop the ideas and concepts that lead to the Secure, Transportable, Autonomous Reactor (STAR) program proposals to the DOE Nuclear Energy Research Initiative (NERI). The STAR program consists of a team of three national laboratories (LLNL, ANL, and LANL), three universities, (UC Berkeley, TAMU, and MIT) and the Westinghouse Research Center. Based on the LLNL work and their own efforts on related work this team prepared and integrated a package of twelve proposals that will carry the LDRD work outlined here into the next phase of development. We are proposing to develop a new nuclear system that meets stringent requirements for a high degree of safety and proliferation resistance, and also deals directly with the related nuclear waste and spent fuel management issues.

In 1997 we first postulated the existence of a special human population that had had their skeletons inadvertently isotopically adulterated in the past. We theorized that the population, and the necessary LLNL accelerator mass spectrometer (AMS) measurement technology, would prove a significant resource in the fight to combat osteoporosis. This LDRD project was to establish such. The project was significantly successful in its initial year, but was not renewed for another and the research is now ended at LLNL. We proposed a three-year program to (1) confirm the magnitude and extent of historical 41 Ca dosing, (2) exactly characterize the long-term 41 Ca signal by comparing it with conventional measurements of skeletal health, and (3) demonstrate the utility of the historically labeled population in evaluating an actual potential therapy for osteoporosis. However, rather than investigate historical records to learn the identity of those inadvertently dosed, find them, and if possible enroll them into a new protocol, this project was to be particularly efficient by making use of a multiyear archive of samples from original, inadvertent 41 Ca-dosing experiments at Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska. Because the subjects had been dosed in conventional studies of calcium kinetics, much important correlating historical …

This report provides information about the Debt-Limit Legislation in the Congressional Budget Process. The gross federal debt consists of the debt held by the public plus the debt held by government accounts.

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The report is about the AC Quadrupole in RHIC

Budget reconciliation is an optional two-step process Congress may use to assure compliance with the direct spending, revenue, and debt-limit levels set forth in budget resolutions.

The annual budget resolution sets forth Congress's budget plan for a period of at least five fiscal years. It includes total levels of spending, revenues, and the debt limit for each of the fiscal years covered.

Sequestration--the automatic across-the-board cancellation of budgetary resources for the purpose of enforcing budgetary goals--was first established by the 1985 Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act (Title II of P.L. 99-177). Section 254 of this act, as amended, provides a timetable for sequestration actions.

This report discusses the federal fiscal year which is the accounting period of the federal government.

In its most elemental form, the federal budget is a comprehensive accounting of the government’s spending, revenues, and borrowing. This fact sheet provides a brief overview of the basic terminology and concepts used in the federal budget process.

Consideration of a concurrent budget resolution is governed by special procedures in the House and Senate. Although the procedures of each chamber differ, they serve generally to expedite consideration of the budget resolution.

The Congressional Budget Act (CBA) of 1974 (Titles I-IX of P.L. 93-344), as amended, established the concurrent budget resolution as the centerpiece of the congressional budget process. This report discusses the budget resolution, which provides the framework for subsequent legislative action on the annual appropriations bills, revenue measures, debt-limit legislation, reconciliation legislation (if required), and any other budgetary legislation.

Baselines and scorekeeping are an integral part of the federal budget process, providing Congress and the President with a framework for making and enforcing budgetary decisions. A baseline serves as a benchmark for federal budget decisions. While the Office of Management and Budget (0MB) and the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) create different baselines, their baselines project federal spending, revenue, and budget surplus or deficit amounts that would occur if existing budget policies were left unchanged. Scorekeeping is the process by which the budgetary impact of proposed and enacted budget policies is measured; it assists Congress and the President in making and enforcing budgetary decisions

Sequestration is the cancellation of budgetary resources for the purpose of enforcing statutory budget limits and pay-as-you-go (PAYGO) requirements. This process is triggered automatically when these statutory limits or PAYGO rules have been violated as a result of legislative actions.

Discretionary spending limits are statutory caps on the level of budget authority and outlays determined through the annual appropriations process. They were initially established by the Budget Enforcement Act (BEA) of 1990 (Title XIII of P.L. 101-508) as part of an agreement between Congress and President George Bush to reduce the deficit. Twice since, they were extended to enforce agreements between Congress and President Bill Clinton, most recently to achieve a surplus.

The Congressional Budget Act (CBA) of 1974 (P.L. 93-344), as amended, establishes the congressional budget process, which coordinates the legislative activities on the budget resolution, appropriations bills, reconciliation legislation, revenue measures, and other budgetary legislation. Section 300 of this act provides a timetable (see Table 1) so that Congress may complete its work on the budget by the start of the fiscal year on October 1.

Treatment of mixed waste from coal conversion wastewaters involves the degradation of toxic organics and the removal of heavy metals. An integrated and cost-effective treatment scheme that can implement such a process is considered essential to promote continued development and growth of coal conversion processes without any deleterious effects on our ecosystem. We have recently developed a pH-dependent, reversible heavy metal adsorption/desorption process which promises to be a cost-effective alternative to the treatment and disposal options currently in place for these inorganic contaminants. Our work shows that: (1) Polydisperse, industrial-grade surfactants can be used in the development of novel, surfactant-coated smectitic clays containing up to 50% by weight of adsorbed surfactant, (2) Reversible adsorption and resorption of cationic (CU(II) and Cd(II)) and anionic (Cr(VI)) heavy metals from their respective aqueous solutions onto these surfactant-modified smectites can be effected using pH of the medium as a switch, and (3) These surfactant-modified smectites can be repeatedly used (up to 5 times) with only a minimal loss in their adsorption potency and with very little leaching of the adsorbed surfactants.

This sampling and analysis plan identifies characterization objectives pertaining to sample collection, laboratory analytical evaluation, and reporting requirements for vapor samples obtained to address vapor issued related to the sluicing of tank 241-C-106. The Waste Retrieving Sluicing System was installed to retrieve and transfer high-heat sludge from tank 241-C-106 to tank 241-AY-102, which is designed for high-heat waste storage. During initial sluicing of tank 241-C-106 in November 1998, operations were halted due to detection of unexpected high total organic compounds that exceeded regulatory permit limits. Several workers also reported smelling sharp odors and throat irritation. Vapor grab samples from the 296-C-006 ventilation system were taken as soon as possible after the detection; the analyses indicated that volatile and semi-volatile organic compounds were present.