This report talks about Electricity regulation and transmission issues. It also includes the history of the California Electricity Crisis.

This document is the report of a workshop held under NSET auspices in March 2004 aimed at identifying and articulating the relationship of nanoscale science and technology to the Nation's energy future.

''The Disposal Criticality Analysis Methodology Topical Report'' prescribes an approach to the methodology for performing postclosure criticality analyses within the monitored geologic repository at Yucca Mountain, Nevada. An essential component of the methodology is the ''Configuration Generator Model for In-Package Criticality'' that provides a tool to evaluate the probabilities of degraded configurations achieving a critical state. The configuration generator model is a risk-informed, performance-based process for evaluating the criticality potential of degraded configurations in the monitored geologic repository. The method uses event tree methods to define configuration classes derived from criticality scenarios and to identify configuration class characteristics (parameters, ranges, etc.). The probabilities of achieving the various configuration classes are derived in part from probability density functions for degradation parameters. The NRC has issued ''Safety Evaluation Report for Disposal Criticality Analysis Methodology Topical Report, Revision 0''. That report contained 28 open items that required resolution through additional documentation. Of the 28 open items, numbers 5, 6, 9, 10, 18, and 19 were concerned with a previously proposed software approach to the configuration generator methodology and, in particular, the k{sub eff} regression analysis associated with the methodology. However, the use of a k{sub eff} regression analysis is not part of the …

The primary goal since inception of this DOE grant award in 1991 to Wellman Laboratories of Photomedicine, Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital, has been to support competitive research fellowships aimed at solving important medical problems, contributing significant new knowledge and/or technology. This approach was taken according to the original intent of the DOE program, to foster excellent centers for research and development of lasers and optics in medicine. Laser photomedicine broadly encompasses optical therapy and optical diagnostics, within any organ system. The research supported clearly reflects this breadth and depth.

This report reviews the U.S.-sponsored funding and programs directed toward women and children in Afghanistan and Iraq. The national and international response to the plight of Afghan and Iraqi women, even to their most recent experience under the Taliban in Afghanistan or Baathist regime in Iraq, will impact their future role and the long-term developments in each country, such as the implementation of a new constitution, the incorporation of women in local and national governance, the role of Islam and the state, the growth of the economy, the curbing of security concerns, and the role of U.S. and international assistance. This report will be updated as events warrant.

Most large-scale applications of high-critical-temperature superconductors will require conductors that can carry large currents in the presence of applied magnetic fields. This report describes progress at Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) in the research and development of practical superconducting components and devices. These efforts primarily focus on the use of Y-Ba-Cu-O system in second-generation conductors, but they also include investigations of Bi-Pb-Sr-Ca-Cu-O systems for use in first-generation conductors. Results are presented in the areas of processing first-generation superconductors and second-generation (2G) superconductors with several different architectures, applying Raman microscopy to the characterization of 2G conductors, studying the role of oxygen doping in the grain boundary transport of 2G conductors, and evaluating the mechanical properties of 2G conductors.

This report is one of a series that profiles the emergency management and homeland security statutory authorities of the 50 states, the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, and three territories (American Samoa, Guam, and the U.S. Virgin Islands). Each profile identifies the more significant elements of state statutes, generally as codified. This report focuses on the state of South Carolina.

This report is one of a series that profiles the emergency management and homeland security statutory authorities of the 50 states, the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, and three territories (American Samoa, Guam, and the U.S. Virgin Islands). Each profile identifies the more significant elements of state statutes, generally as codified. This report focuses on the state of South Dakota.

Dynamic fracture is a material failure process at high strain-rates. Here, we limit our discussion to spallation fracture during shock wave loading. When a compressive shock wave reflects from a free surface, internal states of tension are created. If this tension exceeds the rupture strength of the material, it fails by nucleating and growing microscopic voids in ductile metals and cracks in brittle solids. This effect, known as spallation, was reported by Hopkinson in 1872 [1]. Rinehart and Pierson [2] give an historical introduction to spallation and other aspects of high strain-rate deformation. This phenomenology of the nucleation and growth of microscopic voids is common to all fracture in ductile metals, including dynamic fracture. The importance of pulse duration was not fully appreciated until the 1960's through the work of Butcher and colleagues [3, 4], leading to the concept of cumulative damage. This concept of damage accumulation was put on a strong experimental foundation by Barbee et al. [5], who performed gas gun recovery experiments and tediously measured the size and distribution of microscopic flaws using 2D microscopy. The resulting continuum material model of dynamic fracture is known as the SRI-NAG model [6, 7], for Nucleation And Growth. In a …

The dispersion properties of ion acoustic waves (IAW) are sensitive to the strength of ion-ion collisions in multi-species plasma in which the different species usually have differing charge-to-mass ratios. The modification of the frequency and damping of the fast and slow acoustic modes in a plasma composed of light (low Z) and heavy (high Z) ions is considered. In the fluid limit where the light ion scattering mean free path, {lambda}{sub th} is smaller than the acoustic wavelength, {lambda} = 2{pi}/k, the interspecies friction and heat flow carried by the light ions scattering from the heavy ions causes the damping. In the collisionless limit, k{lambda}{sub th} >> 1, Landau damping by the light ions provides the dissipation. In the intermediate regime when k{lambda}{sub th} {approx} 1, the damping is at least as large as the sum of the collisional and Landau damping.

The Report Abstract provides summaries of the past year's activities relating to each of the main project objectives. Some of the objectives will be expanded on in greater detail further down in the report. The following objectives have their own addition sections in the report: SFP Construction and Fuel Production, Impact of SFP Fuel on Engine Performance, Fleet Testing at WMATA and Denali National Park, Demonstration of Clean Diesel Fuels in Diesel Electric Generators in Alaska, and Economic Analysis. ICRC provided overall project organization and budget management for the project. ICRC held meetings with various project participants. ICRC presented at the Department of Energy's annual project review meeting. The plant began producing fuel in October 2004. The first delivery of finished fuel was made in March of 2004 after the initial start-up period.

Environmental surveillance of the Hanford Site and surrounding areas is conducted by the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). Sampling is conducted to evaluate levels of radioactive and nonradioactive pollutants in the Hanford environs. This document contains the calendar year 2004 schedules for the routine and non-routine collection of samples for the Surface Environmental Surveillance Project (SESP) and Drinking Water Monitoring Project.

Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) established an area monitoring dosimeter program in accordance with Article 514 of the Department of Energy (DOE) Radiological Control Manual (RCM) in January 1993. This program is to minimize the number of areas requiring issuance of personnel dosimeters and to demonstrate that doses outside Radiological Buffer Areas are negligible. In accordance with 10 CFR Part 835.402 (a)(1)-(4) and Article 511.1 of the PNNL Radiological Control Program Description, personnel dosimetry shall be provided to (1) radiological workers who are likely to receive at least 100 mrem annually, and (2) declared pregnant workers, minors, and members of the public who are likely to receive at least 50 mrem annually. Program results for calendar years 1993-2003 confirm that personnel dosimetry is not needed for individuals located in areas monitored by the program.

Microbiology is undergoing a quiet revolution. Techniques such as polymerase chain reaction, high throughput DNA sequencing, whole genome shotgun sequencing, DNA microarrays, and bioinformatics analyses are greatly aiding our understanding of the estimated one billion species of microbes that inhabit the Earth. Unfortunately, the rapid pace of research in microbiology stands in contrast to the much slower pace of change in educational reform. Biological Sciences Curriculum Study (BSCS) hosted a two-day planning meeting to discuss whether or not a new curriculum unit on microbiology is desirable for the high school audience. Attending the meeting were microbiologists, high school biology teachers, and science educators. The consensus of the participants was that an inquiry-based unit dealing with advances in microbiology should be developed for a high school biology audience. Participants established content priorities for the unit, discussed the unit's conceptual flow, brainstormed potential student activities, and discussed the role of educational technology for the unit. As a result of the planning meeting discussions, BSCS staff sought additional funding to develop, disseminate, and evaluate the Frontiers in Microbiology curriculum unit. This unit was intended to be developed as a replacement unit suitable for an introductory biology course. The unit would feature inquiry-based student …

This discusses a range of issues likely to be raised during any reauthorization debate, the reasons behind them, and possible proposals that could be offered to address these concerns.

Texture, the preference for a particular crystallographic orientation in polycrystalline materials, plays an important role in controlling such diverse materials properties as corrosion resistance, recording density in magnetic media and electrical transport in superconductors [1]. Without texture, polycrystalline oxide superconductors contain many high-angle, weak-linked grain boundaries which reduce critical current densities by several orders of magnitude [2]. One approach for inducing texture in oxide superconductors has been the epitaxial growth of films on rolling-assisted biaxially-textured substrates (RABiTS) [3]. In this approach, rolled Ni foils are recrystallized under conditions that lead to a high degree of biaxial {l_brace}001{r_brace}<100> cube texture. Subsequent deposition of epitaxial oxide buffer layers (typically CeO{sub 2} and YSZ as chemical barriers) and superconducting YBCO preserves the lattice alignment, eliminating high-angle boundaries and enabling high critical current densities, J{sub c} > 10{sup 6}/cm{sup 2}. Conventional x-ray diffraction using {omega}- and {phi}-scans typically shows macroscopic biaxial texture to within {approx}5{sup o}-10{sup o} FWHM for all layers, but does not describe the local microstructural features that control the materials properties. Understanding and controlling the local texture and microstructural evolution of processes associated with heteroepitaxial growth, differential thermal contraction and cracking remain significant challenges in this complex system [4], as well …

Our research focused on (1) microbial reduction of Fe(III) and U(VI) individually, and concomitantly in natural sediments, (2) Fe(III) oxide surface chemistry, specifically with respect to reactions with Fe(II)and U(VI), (3) the influence of humic substances on Fe(III) and U(VI) bioreduction, and on U(VI) complexation, and (4) the development of reaction-based reactive transport biogeochemical models to numerically simulate our experimental results. We have continued our investigations on microbial reduction of Fe(III) oxides. Modeling our earlier experimental results required assumption of a hydrated surface for hematite, more reactive than predicted based on theoretical solubility (Burgos et al.2002). Subsequent studies with Shewanella putrefaciens and Geobacter sulfurreducens confirmed the rates of Fe(III) bioreduction depend on oxide surface area rather than oxide thermodynamic properties (Roden,2003a,b;2004; Burgos et al,2003). We examined the potential for bioreduction of U(VI) by Geobacter sulfurreducens in the presence of synthetic Fe(III) oxides and natural Fe(III) oxide-containing solids (Jeon et al,2004a,b) in which more than 95% of added U(VI) was sorbed to mineral surfaces. The results showed a significant portion of solid-associated U(VI) was resistant to both enzymatic and abiotic (Fe(II)-driven) reduction, but the rate and extent of bioreduction of U(VI) was increased due to the addition of anthraquinone-2,6-disulfonate (AQDS). We …

Nucleation-growth kinetic expressions are derived for thermal decomposition of HMX from a variety of thermal analysis data types, including mass loss for isothermal and constant rate heating in an open pan and heat flow for isothermal and constant rate heating in open and closed pans. Conditions are identified in which thermal runaway is small to nonexistent, which typically means temperatures less than 255 C and heating rates less than 1 C/min. Activation energies are typically in the 140 to 165 kJ/mol range for open pan experiments and about 150 to 165 kJ/mol for sealed pan experiments. Our activation energies tend to be slightly lower than those derived from data supplied by the University of Utah, which we consider the best previous thermal analysis work. The reaction clearly displays more than one process, and most likely three processes, which are most clearly evident in open pan experiments. The reaction is accelerated in closed pan experiments, and one global reaction appears to fit the data well. Comparison of our rate measurements with additional literature sources for open and closed low temperature pyrolysis from Sandia gives a likely activation energy of 165 kJ/mol at 10% conversion.

Decomposition kinetics are determined for HMX (nitramine octahydro-1,3,5,7-tetranitro-1,3,5,7-tetrazocine) and CP (2-(5-cyanotetrazalato) pentaammine cobalt (III) perchlorate) separately and together. For high levels of thermal stress, the two materials decompose faster as a mixture than individually. This effect is observed both in high-temperature thermal analysis experiments and in long-term thermal aging experiments. An Arrhenius plot of the 10% level of HMX decomposition by itself from a diverse set of experiments is linear from 120 to 260 C, with an apparent activation energy of 165 kJ/mol. Similar but less extensive thermal analysis data for the mixture suggests a slightly lower activation energy for the mixture, and an analogous extrapolation is consistent with the amount of gas observed in the long-term detonator aging experiments, which is about 30 times greater than expected from HMX by itself for 50 months at 100 C. Even with this acceleration, however, it would take {approx}10,000 years to achieve 10% decomposition at {approx}30 C. Correspondingly, negligible decomposition is predicted by this kinetic model for a few decades aging at temperatures slightly above ambient. This prediction is consistent with additional sealed-tube aging experiments at 100-120 C, which are estimated to have an effective thermal dose greater than that from decades …

We have proposed a technique that could reduce CO{sub 2} emissions from near coastal fossil-fuel power plants using existing power plant cooling water flow rates (Rau and Caldeira, 1999; Caldeira and Rau, 2000). Preliminary cost estimates are as low as $68 per tonne C sequestered, as compared to > $170 per tonne C estimated for other approaches to CO{sub 2} separation with geologic or deep-ocean storage. Engineers at McDermott Technologies, Inc., have independently estimated the cost of our proposed technique, and came to the conclusion that our cost estimates were at the high end of the likely range. Interest has been expressed in pursuing this approach further both in Norway and in Japan. We have proved the viability of our concept using (1) bench-top laboratory experiments (Figures 1 and 2), (2) computer modeling of those experiments, (3) more sophisticated cost estimates, and (4) three-dimensional computer modeling of the consequences to global ocean chemistry (Figure 3 and 4). The climate and environmental impacts of our current, carbon intensive energy usage demands that effective and practical energy alternatives and CO{sub 2} mitigation strategies be found. As part of this effort, various means of capturing and storing CO{sub 2} generated from fossil-fuel-based energy …

This is one report in the series of reports that discuss the campaign finance practices and related issues. Concerns over financing federal elections have become a seemingly perennial aspect of our political system, centered on the enduring issues of high campaign costs and reliance on interest groups for needed campaign funds. The report talks about the today’s paramount issues such as perceived loopholes in current law and the longstanding issues: overall costs, funding sources, and competition.

The Department of Energy is sponsoring an initiative to facilitate efficient, effective and responsible use of Monitored Natural Attenuation and Enhanced Passive Remediation for chlorinated solvents. This Office of Environmental Management ''Alternative Project,'' focuses on providing scientific and policy support for MNA/EPR. A broadly representative working group of scientists supports the project along with partnerships with regulatory organizations such as the Interstate Technology Regulatory Council and the Environmental Protection Agency. The initial product of the technical working group was a summary report that articulated the conceptual approach and central scientific tenants of the project, and that identified a prioritized listing of technical targets for field research. This report documented the process in which scientific ground rules were developed, lines of inquiry were identified and then critically evaluated, promising applied research topics were highlighted in the various lines of inquiry, and these were discussed and prioritized. The summary report will serve as a resource to guide management and decision making throughout the period of the subject MNA/EPR Alternative Project. To support and more fully document the information presented in the summary report, we are publishing a series of supplemental documents that present the full texts from the technical analyses within the …

This work contained two objectives. To verify the mathematical equations developed for the physical properties of concentrated cesium eluate solutions against experimental test results obtained with simulated feeds. To estimate the physical properties of the radioactive AW-101 cesium eluate at saturation using the validated models. The Hanford River Protection Project (RPP) Hanford Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant (WTP) is currently being built to extract radioisotopes from the vast inventory of Hanford tank wastes and immobilize them in a silicate glass matrix for eventual disposal at a geological repository. The baseline flowsheet for the pretreatment of supernatant liquid wastes includes removal of cesium using regenerative ion-exchange resins. The loaded cesium ion-exchange columns will be eluted with nitric acid nominally at 0.5 molar, and the resulting eluate solution will be concentrated in a forced-convection evaporator to reduce the storage volume and to recover the acid for reuse. The reboiler pot is initially charged with a concentrated nitric acid solution and kept under a controlled vacuum during feeding so the pot contents would boil at 50 degrees Celsius. The liquid level in the pot is maintained constant by controlling both the feed and boilup rates. The feeding will continue with no bottom removal …

The monocular passive ranging (MPR) problem in remote sensing consists of identifying the precise range of an airborne target (missile, plane, etc.) from its observed radiance. This inverse problem may be set as a global optimization problem (GOP) whereby the difference between the observed and model predicted radiances is minimized over the possible ranges and atmospheric conditions. Using additional information about the error function between the predicted and observed radiances of the target, we developed GMG, a new algorithm to find the Global Minimum with a Guarantee. The new algorithm transforms the original continuous GOP into a discrete search problem, thereby guaranteeing to find the position of the global minimum in a reasonably short time. The algorithm is first applied to the golf course problem, which serves as a litmus test for its performance in the presence of both complete and degraded additional information. GMG is further assessed on a set of standard benchmark functions and then applied to various realizations of the MPR problem.