This report discusses legislation that would establish or enhance a statutory minimum term of imprisonment for some federal crimes, including drug offenses, crimes involving firearms, aggravated computer abuse, illegal reentry, and violence against public servants.

This report is a brief summary of what carbon capture and storage (CCS) is, how it is supposed to work, why it has gained the interest and support of some members of Congress, and what some of the challenges are to its implementation and deployment across the United States.

This report discusses dozens of temporary tax provisions that are scheduled to expire at the end of 2013 under current law. Most of the provisions set to expire in 2013 have been part of past temporary tax extension legislation.

This report examines the Consumer Product Safety Commission's (CPSC) role in regulating U.S. imported and exported consumer products. It also examines some of the international obligations that the United States has undertaken with respect to the promulgation of standards-related measures, such as mandatory consumer product safety regulations.

This report discusses the federal crimes that are usually punishable by a statutory maximum term of imprisonment, for example, "imprisoned for not more than 5 years."

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The objective of this project was to demonstrate the potential of a new process technology to reduce the energy consumption and CO{sub 2} emission from the production of titanium dioxide (TiO{sub 2}) pigment. TiO{sub 2} is one of the most commonly used minerals in the chemical manufacturing industry. It has been commercially processed as a pigment since the early 1900's, and has a wide variety of domestic and industrial applications. TiO{sub 2} pigment is currently produced primarily by the use of the so called �chloride process�. A key step of the chloride process relies on high temperature carbo-chlorination of TiO{sub 2} bearing raw materials, hence producing large quantities of CO{sub 2}. The new method uses a chemical/metallurgical sequential extraction methodology to produce pigment grade TiO{sub 2} from high-TiO{sub 2} slag. The specific project objectives were to 1) study and prove the scientific validity of the concept, 2) understand the primary chemical reactions and the efficiency of sequential extraction schemes, 3) determine the properties of TiO{sub 2} produced using the technology, and 4) model the energy consumptions and environmental benefits of the technology. These objectives were successfully met and a new process for producing commercial quality TiO{sub 2} pigment was developed …

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This report is the third in a series of reports sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy Geothermal Technologies Program in which a range of water-related issues surrounding geothermal power production are evaluated. The first report made an initial attempt at quantifying the life cycle fresh water requirements of geothermal power-generating systems and explored operational and environmental concerns related to the geochemical composition of geothermal fluids. The initial analysis of life cycle fresh water consumption of geothermal power-generating systems identified that operational water requirements consumed the vast majority of water across the life cycle. However, it relied upon limited operational water consumption data and did not account for belowground operational losses for enhanced geothermal systems (EGSs). A second report presented an initial assessment of fresh water demand for future growth in utility-scale geothermal power generation. The current analysis builds upon this work to improve life cycle fresh water consumption estimates and incorporates regional water availability into the resource assessment to improve the identification of areas where future growth in geothermal electricity generation may encounter water challenges. This report is divided into nine chapters. Chapter 1 gives the background of the project and its purpose, which is to assess the water …

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