This issue of Alternative Fuel News contains information on the upcoming Clean Cities Conference to be held May 7--10, 2000 in San Diego, California. Highlighted in this issue is the success of the Clean Cities Program in creating clean corridors that permit fleets that serve multiple cities to purchase AFVs with confidence, knowing that fueling convenience and supply will not be a problem. Also look for articles on electric vehicles, transit buses; state and fuel provider enforcement; the Salt Lake and Greater Long Island Clean Cities coalitions, HEVs and fuel cells are a big hit at auto shows; DOE awards alternative fuel grants to 33 National Parks; and the Energy Policy Act (EPAct) Section 506 report.

The fascinating shapes and hierarchical designs of biomineralized structures are an inspiration to materials scientists because of the potential they suggest for biomolecular control over materials synthesis. Conversely, the failure to prevent or limit tissue mineralization in the vascular, skeletal, and urinary systems is a common source of disease. Understanding the mechanisms by which organisms direct or limit crystallization has long been a central challenge to the biomineralization community. One prevailing view is that mineral-associated macromolecules are responsible for either inhibiting crystallization or initiating and stabilizing non-equilibrium crystal polymorphs and morphologies through interactions between anionic moieties and cations in solution or at mineralizing surfaces. In particular, biomolecules that present carboxyl groups to the growing crystal have been implicated as primary modulators of growth. Here we review the results from a combination of in situ atomic force microscopy (AFM) and molecular modeling (MM) studies to investigate the effect of specific interactions between carboxylate-rich biomolecules and atomic steps on crystal surfaces during the growth of carbonates, oxalates and phosphates of calcium. Specifically, we how the growth kinetics and morphology depend on the concentration of additives that include citrate, simple amino acids, synthetic Asp-rich polypeptides, and naturally occurring Asp-rich proteins found in both …

DOE's Office of Building Technology, State and Community Programs (BTS) is facilitating an industry-led initiative to develop a series of technology roadmaps that identify key goals and strategies for different areas of the building and equipment industry. This roadmapping initiative is a fundamental component of the BTS strategic plan and will help to align government resources with the high-priority needs identified by industry.

Nature uses enzymes to activate otherwise unreactive compounds in remarkable ways. For example, DNases are capable of hydrolyzing phosphate diester bonds in DNA within seconds,[1-3]--a reaction with an estimated half-life of 200 million years without an enzyme.[4] The fundamental features of enzyme catalysis have been much discussed over the last sixty years in an effort to explain the dramatic rate increases and high selectivities of enzymes. As early as 1946, Linus Pauling suggested that enzymes must preferentially recognize and stabilize the transition state over the ground state of a substrate.[5] Despite the intense study of enzymatic selectivity and ability to catalyze chemical reactions, the entire nature of enzyme-based catalysis is still poorly understood. For example, Houk and co-workers recently reported a survey of binding affinities in a wide variety of enzyme-ligand, enzyme-transition-state, and synthetic host-guest complexes and found that the average binding affinities were insufficient to generate many of the rate accelerations observed in biological systems.[6] Therefore, transition-state stabilization cannot be the sole contributor to the high reactivity and selectivity of enzymes, but rather, other forces must contribute to the activation of substrate molecules. Inspired by the efficiency and selectivity of Nature, synthetic chemists have admired the ability of enzymes …

Fact sheet describing NREL's work with Recombination Technologies and Optima Batteries to develop a current interrupt charging algorithm to extend the deep life cycle of valve-regulated lead-acid batteries.

After conducting an in-house motor system performance evaluation, 3M managed to reduce electricity use by 41%, decrease kilowatt demand by 20%, and reduce steam and chilled water use. Order your copy now and read how the Minnesota-based company was able to do it.

This fact sheet summarizes the accomplishments of the programs of the Clean Cities that won awards for 1999.

A brief overview of the Clean Cities International program, including background and plans for the future.

In November 1994, the Portland Clean Cities Coalition became the 28th Clean City. And Number 28 took off and quickly picked up speed. By the end of 1999, the group had grown so much that it sought re-designation under a new name, the Columbia-Willamette Clean Cities Coalition, to better reflect the much larger geographical area it had come to represent. The coalition now represents two states, encompassing much of southwest Washington and most of Oregon. Several municipal agencies, along with many private companies, are participating in Vancouver, Washington; and in Portland, Eugene, and Salem, Oregon. With this geographical expansion came an increase in stakeholders, and in 1999 the coalition added a record number of 65 stakeholders, including three local transit districts, two utility districts, three cities, two counties, five alternative fuel original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), and numerous other local businesses.

This fact sheet explains how concentrating solar power technology works and the three types of systems in development today: trough, dish, and central receiver.

Designated a Clean City in 1995, Dallas-Fort Worth now includes 140 coalition members and interested parties who operate more than 5,800 alternative fuel vehicles. Dallas-Fort Worth Clean Cities is administered by the North Central Texas Council of Governments, the metropolitan planning organization for the region, which represents hundreds of municipal and local government agencies.

We present the development and application of compatible finite element discretizations of electromagnetics problems derived from the time dependent, full wave Maxwell equations. We review the H(curl)-conforming finite element method, using the concepts and notations of differential forms as a theoretical framework. We chose this approach because it can handle complex geometries, it is free of spurious modes, it is numerically stable without the need for filtering or artificial diffusion, it correctly models the discontinuity of fields across material boundaries, and it can be very high order. Higher-order H(curl) and H(div) conforming basis functions are not unique and we have designed an extensible C++ framework that supports a variety of specific instantiations of these such as standard interpolatory bases, spectral bases, hierarchical bases, and semi-orthogonal bases. Virtually any electromagnetics problem that can be cast in the language of differential forms can be solved using our framework. For time dependent problems a method-of-lines scheme is used where the Galerkin method reduces the PDE to a semi-discrete system of ODE's, which are then integrated in time using finite difference methods. For time integration of wave equations we employ the unconditionally stable implicit Newmark-Beta method, as well as the high order energy conserving …

A hybrid photovoltaic system provides Pinnacles National Monument with electrical services in an environmentally sensitive area. This quite, unobtrusive system provides the Chapparral area with clean, reliable electricity. Installing renewable energy projects at Federal facilities provides Federal agencies an opportunity to fulfill their mandate for responsible stewardship of national resources with cost-effective environmentally benign technologies.

The experimental and theoretical studies described above illustrate the complex nature of the heteronuclear metal-metal bond. In many cases, bimetallic bonding induces a significant redistribution of charge around the bonded metals. This redistribution of charge is usually linked to the strength of the bimetallic bond, affects the position of the core and valence levels of the metals, and can determine the chemical reactivity of the system under study. New concepts are emerging [22,23,34,36] and eventually the coupling of experiment and theory can be useful for designing more efficient bimetallic catalysts [98,106,107].

An essential part of the environmental assessments is the characterization of the subsurface hydrogeology. Hydrogeological characterization involves establishing the hydrologic and geologic conditions and incorporating this information into groundwater flow and contaminant transport models.

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is promoting the use of alternative fuels and alternative fuel vehicles (AFVs). To support this activity, DOE has directed the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) to conduct projects to evaluate the performance and acceptability of light-duty AFVs. A 1999 F-250 bi-fuel propane pickup was run through a series of tests while operating on LPB and gasoline. The tests are explained briefly in this fact sheet.

Read this Technical Case Study to discover how Louisiana Pacific Corporation, a Motor Challenge Showcase Demonstration project partner, was able to realize substantial energy and cost savings by optimizing its fan system.

This report is a primer for industry (inventors and corporations) on how to license technology.

Consumers in Pennsylvania, Virginia, Delaware, Maryland, the District of Columbia, West Virginia, and New Jersey are showing increased interest in solar electric systems for their homes and businesses. This booklet provides basic information about buying a PV system. Photovoltaic (PV) systems are reliable, pollution free, and use a renewable source of energy, the sun. A PV system can be a substantial investment and careful planning will help ensure that you make the right decisions.

Increasing numbers of transit agencies across North America are making the choice to convert their bus fleets to compressed natural gas (CNG), and even more are seriously considering it. Natural gas buses now account for at least 20{percent} of all new bus orders. However, it becomes difficult for fleet operators to fairly evaluate the potential benefits of an alternative fuel program if they are confronted with misinformation or poor comparisons based on false assumptions. This fact sheet addresses some of the most common misconceptions that seem to work their way into anecdotal stories, media reports, and even some poorly researched white papers and feasibility studies. It is an expanded version of information that was presented on behalf of the U.S. Department of Energy at the South Coast Air Basin Alternative Fuel and Electric Transit Bus Workshop in Diamond Bar, California, on March 15, 2000.

Integral curves, such as streamlines, streaklines, pathlines, and timelines, are an essential tool in the analysis of vector field structures, offering straightforward and intuitive interpretation of visualization results. While such curves have a long-standing tradition in vector field visualization, their application to Adaptive Mesh Refinement (AMR) simulation results poses unique problems. AMR is a highly effective discretization method for a variety of physical simulation problems and has recently been applied to the study of vector fields in flow and magnetohydrodynamic applications. The cell-centered nature of AMR data and discontinuities in the vector field representation arising from AMR level boundaries complicate the application of numerical integration methods to compute integral curves. In this paper, we propose a novel approach to alleviate these problems and show its application to streamline visualization in an AMR model of the magnetic field of the solar system as well as to a simulation of two incompressible viscous vortex rings merging.

By upgrading its motor systems at its Richmond, California, refinery, Chevron was able to realize cost savings of more than $700,000 per year, in addition to reduced energy consumption of approximately 1 million kilowatts per month and improved equipment reliability and process control. Order this fact sheet to find out how they did it.

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This OIT Technical Case Study reveals how Bethlehem Steel Corporation, by installing a variable-frequency drive and making associated equipment modifications, was able to save energy, reduce operational costs, and decrease system maintenance.