Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy project sheet summarizing general information about the Innovative Materials and Processes for Advanced Carbon Capture Technologies (IMPACCT) program including critical needs, innovation and advantages, impacts, and contact information. This sheet discusses the development of synthetic catalysts as part of the "Catalytic Improvement of Solvent Capture Systems" project.

Project objective is to develop and disseminate accurate, objective information on critical wind energy issues impacting market acceptance of hundreds of land-based projects and vast off-shore wind developments proposed in the 6-state New England region, thereby accelerating the pace of wind installation from today's 140 MW towards the region's 20% by 2030 goals of 12,500 MW. Methodology: This objective will be accomplished by accumulating, developing, assembling timely, accurate, objective and detailed information representing the 'state of the knowledge' on critical wind energy issues impacting market acceptance, and widely disseminating such information. The target audience includes state agencies and local governments; utilities and grid operators; wind developers; agricultural and environmental groups and other NGOs; research organizations; host communities and the general public, particularly those in communities with planned or operating wind projects. Information will be disseminated through: (a) a series of topic-specific web conference briefings; (b) a one-day NEWEEP conference, back-to-back with a Utility Wind Interest Group one-day regional conference organized for this project; (c) posting briefing and conference materials on the New England Wind Forum (NEWF) web site and featuring the content on NEWF electronic newsletters distributed to an opt-in list of currently over 5000 individuals; (d) through interaction with …

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Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy project sheet summarizing general information about the Innovative Materials and Processes for Advanced Carbon Capture Technologies (IMPACCT) program including critical needs, innovation and advantages, impacts, and contact information. This sheet discusses a process for carbon capture through desublimation as part of the "Cryogenic Carbon Capture" project.

Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy project sheet summarizing general information about the Innovative Materials and Processes for Advanced Carbon Capture Technologies (IMPACCT) program including critical needs, innovation and advantages, impacts, and contact information. This sheet discusses turning carbon dioxide exhaust into a solid as part of the "Chemical and Biological Catalytic Enhancement of Weathering of Silicate Minerals as Novel Carbon Capture and Storage" project.

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) (Environmental Management [EM], Office of Packaging and Transportation [EM-45]) Packaging and Certification Program (DOE PCP) has developed a Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tracking and monitoring system, called ARG-US, for the management of nuclear materials packages during transportation and storage. The performance of the ARG-US RFID equipment and system has been fully tested in two demonstration projects in April 2008 and August 2009. With the strong support of DOE-SR and DOE PCP, a field testing program was completed in Savannah River Site's K-Area Material Storage (KAMS) Facility, an active Category I Plutonium Storage Facility, in 2010. As the next step (Phase II) of continued vault testing for the ARG-US system, the Savannah River Site K Area Material Storage facility has placed the ARG-US RFIDs into the 910B storage vault for operational testing. This latest version (Mark III) of the Argonne RFID system now has the capability to measure radiation dose and dose rate. This paper will report field testing progress of the ARG-US RFID equipment in KAMS, the operability and reliability trend results associated with the applications of the system, and discuss the potential benefits in enhancing safety, security and materials accountability. The purpose of …

Reactive Gas Recycling (RGR) technology development has been initiated at Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL), with a stretch-goal to develop a fully dry recycling technology for Used Nuclear Fuel (UNF). This approach is attractive due to the potential of targeted gas-phase treatment steps to reduce footprint and secondary waste volumes associated with separations relying primarily on traditional technologies, so long as the fluorinators employed in the reaction are recycled for use in the reactors or are optimized for conversion of fluorinator reactant. The developed fluorination via SF{sub 6}, similar to the case for other fluorinators such as NF{sub 3}, can be used to address multiple fuel forms and downstream cycles including continued processing for LWR via fluorination or incorporation into a aqueous process (e.g. modified FLUOREX) or for subsequent pyro treatment to be used in advanced gas reactor designs such metal- or gas-cooled reactors. This report details the most recent experimental results on the reaction of SF{sub 6} with various fission product surrogate materials in the form of oxides and metals, including uranium oxides using a high-temperature DTA apparatus capable of temperatures in excess of 1000{deg}C . The experimental results indicate that the majority of the fission products form stable …

Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy project sheet summarizing general information about the Rare Earth Alternatives in Critical Technologies (REACT) program including critical needs, innovation and advantages, impacts, and contact information. This sheet discusses a high-current superconducting wire as part of the "High Performance, Low Cost Superconducting Wires and Coils for High Power Wind Generators" project.

This report summarizes the activities of the Baylor University Experimental High Energy Physics (HEP) group on the Collider Detector at Fermilab (CDF) experiment from August 15, 2005 to May 31, 2012. Led by the Principal Investigator (Dr. Jay R. Dittmann), the Baylor HEP group has actively pursued a variety of cutting-edge measurements from proton-antiproton collisions at the energy frontier.

Washington River Protection Solutions, LLC (WRPS) developed an enhanced single-shell tank (SST) integrity project in 2009. An expert panel on SST integrity was created to provide recommendations supporting the development of the project. One primary recommendation was to expand the leak assessment reports (substitute report or LD-1) to include leak causes and locations. The recommendation has been included in the M-045-9IF Hanford Federal Facility Agreement and Consent Order (Tri-Party Agreement) as one of four targets relating to SST leak integrity. The 241-SX Farm (SX Farm) tanks with leak losses were addressed on an individual tank basis as part of LD-1. Currently, 8 out of 23 SSTs that have been reported to having a liner leak are located in SX Farm. This percentage was the highest compared to other tank farms which is why SX Farm was analyzed first. The SX Farm is comprised of fifteen SSTs built 1953-1954. The tanks are arranged in rows of three tanks each, forming a cascade. Each of the SX Farm tanks has a nominal I-million-gal storage capacity. Of the fifteen tanks in SX Farm, an assessment reported leak losses for the following tanks: 241-SX-107, 241-SX-108, 241-SX-109, 241-SX-111, 241-SX-112, 241-SX-113, 241-SX-114 and 241-SX-115. The method …

It has been proposed to implement the so-called Achromatic Telescopic Squeezing (ATS) scheme in the LHC high luminosity (HL) lattice to reduce beta functions at the Interaction Points (IP) up to a factor of 8. As a result, the nominal 4.5 km peak beta functions reached in the Inner Triplets (IT) at collision will be increased by the same factor. This, therefore, justifies the installation of new, larger aperture, superconducting IT quadrupoles. The higher beta functions will enhance the effects of the triplet quadrupole field errors leading to smaller beam dynamic aperture (DA). To maintain the acceptable DA, the effects of the triplet field errors must be re-evaluated, thus specifying new tolerances. Such a study has been performed for the so-called '4444' collision option of the HL-LHC layout version SLHCV3.01, where the IP beta functions are reduced by a factor of 4 in both planes with respect to a pre-squeezed value of 60 cm at two collision points. The dynamic aperture calculations were performed using SixTrack. The impact on the triplet field quality is presented.

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Solar ADEPT Project: Satcon is developing a compact, lightweight power conversion device that is capable of taking utility-scale solar power and outputting it directly into the electric utility grid at distribution voltage levels—eliminating the need for large transformers. Transformers “step up” the voltage of the power that is generated by a solar power system so it can be efficiently transported through transmission lines and eventually “stepped down” to usable voltages before it enters homes and businesses. Power companies step up the voltage because less electricity is lost along transmission lines when the voltage is high and current is low. Satcon’s new power conversion devices will eliminate these heavy transformers and connect a utility-scale solar power system directly to the grid. Satcon’s modular devices are designed to ensure reliability—if one device fails it can be bypassed and the system can continue to run.

Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy project sheet summarizing general information about the High Energy Advanced Thermal Storage (HEATS) program including critical needs, innovation and advantages, impacts, and contact information. This sheet discusses an advanced metal-hydrides-based thermal battery as part of the "A New Generation of High Density Thermal Battery Based on Advanced Metal Hydrides" project.

Our experiments are directed toward the understanding of the physics of rf breakdown in systems that can be used to accelerate electron beams at {approx}11.4 GHz. The structure geometries have apertures, stored energy per cell, and rf pulse duration close to that of the NLC or CLIC. The breakdown rate is the main parameter that we use to compare rf breakdown behavior for different structures at a given set of rf pulse parameters (pulse shape and peak power) at 60 Hz repetition rate. In our experiments, the typical range of the breakdown rate is from one per few hours to {approx}100 per hour. To date we have tested 29 structures. We consistently found that after the initial conditioning, the behavior of the breakdown rate is reproducible for structures of the same geometry and material, and the breakdown rate dependence on peak magnetic fields is stronger than on peak surface electric fields for structures of different geometries. Below we report the main results from tests of seven structures made from hard copper, soft copper alloys and hard-copper alloys. Additional details on these and other structures will be discussed in future publications.

We propose a unique, all-electron, thermodynamic density functional theory (DFT) code that directly predicts full or partial long-range order in crystalline (defected) solids and their effect on electronic properties via a first-principles mean-field theory, scales linear with number of atoms N per unit-cell [i.e. O(N), due to use of a mathematical-based screening in k-space], and addresses up to 1 million atoms using parallel architectures. Novel O(N) algorithms will be developed to permit this for an all-electron KKR Green's functional density-functional theory code.

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The objective of this project was to reduce the technical risk for a hydrostatic transmission based drivetrain for high-power utility-size wind turbines. A theoretical study has been performed to validate the reduction of cost of energy (CoE) for the wind turbine, identify risk mitigation strategies for the drive system and critical components, namely the pump, shaft connection and hydrostatic transmission (HST) controls and address additional benefits such as reduced deployment costs, improved torque density and improved mean time between repairs (MTBR).

This Plan presents progress toward the metering goals shared by all national laboratories and discusses PNNL's contemporary approach to the installation of new meters. In addition, the Plan discusses the data analysis techniques with which PNNL is working to mature using endless data streams made available as a result of increased meter deployment.

This program applied reservoir cathode technology to increase the lifetime of cesiated tungsten photocathodes. Cesiated tungsten photocathodes provide a quantum efficiency of approximately 0.08% when cesium is initially applied to the surface. During operation, however, the cesium evaporates from the surface, resulting in a gradual decrease in quantum efficiency. After 4-6 hours of operation, the efficiency drop to below useful levels, requiring recoating on the emission surface. This program developed a cathode geometry where cesium could be continuously diffused to the surface at a rate matching the evaporation rate. This results in constant current emission until the cesium in the reservoir is depleted. Measurements of the evaporation rate indicated that the reservoir should provide cesium for more than 30,000 hours of continuous operation. This is orders of magnitude longer operation then previously available. Experiments also demonstrated that the photocathode could be rejuvenated following contamination from a vacuum leak. Recoating of the emission surface demonstrated that the initial quantum efficiency could be recovered.

As a national laboratory Argonne concentrates on scientific and technological challenges that can only be addressed through a sustained, interdisciplinary focus at a national scale. Argonne's eight major initiatives, as enumerated in its strategic plan, are Hard X-ray Sciences, Leadership Computing, Materials and Molecular Design and Discovery, Energy Storage, Alternative Energy and Efficiency, Nuclear Energy, Biological and Environmental Systems, and National Security. The purposes of Argonne's Laboratory Directed Research and Development (LDRD) Program are to encourage the development of novel technical concepts, enhance the Laboratory's research and development (R and D) capabilities, and pursue its strategic goals. projects are selected from proposals for creative and innovative R and D studies that require advance exploration before they are considered to be sufficiently developed to obtain support through normal programmatic channels. Among the aims of the projects supported by the LDRD Program are the following: establishment of engineering proof of principle, assessment of design feasibility for prospective facilities, development of instrumentation or computational methods or systems, and discoveries in fundamental science and exploratory development.

A critical research goal for the spherical torus (ST) program is to initiate, ramp-up, and sustain a discharge without using the central solenoid. Simulations of non-solenoidal plasma scenarios in the National Spherical Torus Experiment (NSTX) [1] predict that high-harmonic fast wave (HHFW) heating and current drive (CD) [2] can play an important roll in enabling fully non-inductive (fNI {approx} 1) ST operation. The NSTX fNI {approx} 1 strategy requires 5-6 MW of HHFW power (PRF) to be coupled into a non-inductively generated discharge [3] with a plasma current, Ip {approx} 250-350 kA, driving the plasma into an HHFW H-mode with Ip {approx} 500 kA, a level where 90 keV deuterium neutral beam injection (NBI) can heat the plasma and provide additional CD. The initial approach on NSTX has been to heat Ip {approx} 300 kA, inductively heated, deuterium plasmas with CD phased HHFW power [2], in order to drive the plasma into an H-mode with fNI {approx} 1.

The exciton energy deposited in an argon cluster, (Arn ,< n=20>) using VUV radiation is transferred to softly ionize doped water clusters, ((H2O)n, n=1-9) leading to the formation of non-fragmented clusters. Following the initial excitation, electronic energy is channeled to ionize the doped water cluster while evaporating the Ar shell, allowing identification of fragmented and complete water cluster ions. Examination of the photoionization efficiency curve shows that cluster evaporation from excitons located above 12.6 eV are not enough to cool the energized water cluster ion, and leads to their dissociation to (H2O)n-2H+ (protonated) clusters.

Several past measurements of the Brookhaven ERL at superconducting temperature produced a long list of higher order modes (HOMs). The Niobium 5-cell cavity is terminated with HOM ferrite dampers that successfully reduce the Q-factors to tolerable levels. However, a number of undamped resonances with Q {ge} 10{sup 6} were found at 4 K and their mode identification remained as a goal for this paper. The approach taken here consists in taking different S{sub 21} measurements on a copper cavity replica of the ERL which can be compared with the actual data and also with Microwave Studio computer simulations. Several different S{sub 21} transmission measurements are used, including those taken from the fundamental input coupler to the pick-up probe across the cavity, between probes in a single cell, and between beam-position monitor probes in the beam tubes. Mode identification is supported by bead pulling with a metallic needle or a dielectric sphere that are calibrated in the fundamental mode. This paper presents results for HOMs in the first two dipole bands with the prototypical 958 MHz trapped mode, the lowest beam tube resonances, and high-Q modes in the first quadrupole band and beyond.