Monthly newsletter discussing news and activities related to the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Program, articles about weather and atmospheric phenomena, and other related topics.

Monthly newsletter discussing news and activities related to the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Program, articles about weather and atmospheric phenomena, and other related topics.

Monthly newsletter discussing news and activities related to the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Program, articles about weather and atmospheric phenomena, and other related topics.

Monthly newsletter discussing news and activities related to the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Program, articles about weather and atmospheric phenomena, and other related topics.

The objective of this Class III project is to demonstrate that detailed reservoir characterization of slope and basin clastic reservoirs in sandstones of the Delaware Mountain Group in the Delaware Basin of West Texas and New Mexico is a cost-effective way to recover a higher percentage of the original oil in place through geologically based field development. The project focused on reservoir characterization of the East Ford unit, a representative Delaware Mountain Group field that produces from the upper Bell Canyon Formation (Ramsey Sandstone). The field, discovered in 1960, is operated by Oral Petco, Inc., as the East Ford unit: it contained an estimated 18.4 million barrels (MMbbl) of original oil in place.

Monthly newsletter discussing news and activities related to the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Program, articles about weather and atmospheric phenomena, and other related topics.

Monthly newsletter discussing news and activities related to the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Program, articles about weather and atmospheric phenomena, and other related topics.

This report provides the results of a field evaluation that PNNL conducted for FEMP and the U.S. Postal Service, The report examines the performance of a sulfur lamp technology using two different light distribution systems.

The Big Hill SPR facility located in Jefferson County, Texas has been a permitted operating crude oil storage site since 1986 with benign environmental impacts. However, Congress has not authorized crude oil purchases for the SPR since 1990, and six storage caverns at Big Hill are underutilized with 70 million barrels of available storage capacity. On February 17, 1999, the Secretary of Energy offered the 70 million barrels of available storage at Big Hill for commercial use. Interested commercial users would enter into storage contracts with DOE, and DOE would receive crude oil in lieu of dollars as rental fees. The site could potentially began to receive commercial oil in May 1999. This Environmental Assessment identified environmental changes that potentially would affect water usage, power usage, and air emissions. However, as the assessment indicates, changes would not occur to a major degree affecting the environment and no long-term short-term, cumulative or irreversible impacts have been identified.

Little Pend Oreille National Wildlife Refuge is proposing to acquire a 706-acre property located in Stevens County, Washington. The new acquisition would be called the Kaniksu Unit. A habitat evaluation was conducted on the property using the Habitat Evaluation Procedures (HEP) methodology (U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service 1980). Evaluation species were black-capped chickadee, mallard, ruffed grouse and white-tailed deer. Life requisites evaluated were food and reproduction for black-capped chickadee, food, cover, and reproduction for mallard, available winter browse for white-tailed deer and fall-to-spring cover for ruffed grouse.

The Annual Energy Outlook 1999 (AEO99) presents midterm forecasts of energy supply, demand, and prices through 2020 prepared by the Energy Information Administration (EIA). The projections are based on results from EIA`s National Energy Modeling System (NEMS). The report begins with an Overview summarizing the AEO99 reference case. The next section, Legislation and Regulations, describes the assumptions made with regard to laws that affect energy markets and discusses evolving legislative and regulatory issues. Issues in Focus discusses current energy issues--the economic decline in East Asia, growth in demand for natural gas, vehicle emissions standards, competitive electricity pricing, renewable portfolio standards, and carbon emissions. It is followed by the analysis of energy market trends. The analysis in AEO99 focuses primarily on a reference case and four other cases that assume higher and lower economic growth and higher and lower world oil prices than in the reference case. Forecast tables for these cases are provided in Appendixes A through C. Appendixes D and E present a summary of the reference case forecasts in units of oil equivalence and household energy expenditures. The AEO99 projections are based on Federal, State, and local laws and regulations in effect on July 1, 1998. Pending legislation …

In 1997, the US public and private sectors invested $205.7 billion in R and D. Private sector investments in R&D increased 34% between 1990 and 1997; over the same period the federal government decreased its expenditures by 15% in real terms. Projections of outyear federal budgets indicate the federal government will continue to reduce its investments in R&D for the foreseeable future. Defense R&D continues to be the largest area of concentration for federal government's R&D investments, with defense R&D accounting for 54% of all federal R&D outlays in 1998. Defense R&D is funded at a level which is three times higher than health R&D. Health R&D has experienced the largest inflation-adjusted increases of any federal R&D program, up 21% in real terms since 1990. US national (i.e., public and private) investments in energy R and D currently stand at a 23-year low of $4.4 billion in 1996. Federal support for energy R&D has declined 22% in real terms between 1990 and 1996. Federal energy R&D investments are also undergoing changes in priority. Fossil energy R&D programs are at the beginning of a potentially significant change away from''clean coal'' technology development programs and towards more fundamental research on ways to …

'Mercury and other highly-toxic heavy metals such as cadmium and lead are present in many aquatic environments, and the remediation of such environments or the avoidance of heavy-metal contamination in the first place is an area of active interest. In recent years tougher environmental regulations and the high initial cost of new, more effective, and more selective extractants has made the reuse of extractant materials and the minimization of secondary waste volume a focus of their scientific effort. The authors research has involved the investigation of redox-active layered metal chalcogenides as selective, effective, and redox-recyclable extractants for heavy metals from aqueous solution.'

'The mobility of actinides in surface soils is a key issue of concern at several DOE facilities in arid and semiarid environments, including Rocky Flats, Hanford, Nevada Test Site, Idaho National Engineering Laboratory, and Los Alamos National Laboratory and the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP). Key sources of uncertainty in assessing Pu mobility are the magnitudes of mobility resulting from three modes of transport: (1) wind erosion, (2) water erosion, and (3) vertical migration. Each of these three processes depend on numerous environmental factors and they compete with one another, particularly for actinides in very shallow soils ({approximately} 1 \265m). The overall goal of the study is to quantify the mobility of soil actinides from all three modes. The authors study is using field measurements, laboratory experiments, and ecological modeling to address these three processes at three DOE facilities where actinide kinetics are of concern: WIPP, Rocky Flats, and Hanford. Wind erosion is being measured with suite of monitoring equipment, water erosion is being studied with rainfall simulation experiments, vertical migration is being studied in controlled laboratory experiments, and the three processes are being integrated using ecological modeling. Estimates for clean up of soil actinides for the extensive tracts of …

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This report summarizes the results of the residential No. 2 distillate fuel (home heating oil) and liquefied petroleum gas (propane) price survey over the 1997--1998 winter heating season in Iowa. The Iowa Department of Natural Resources (Department) conducted the survey under a cooperative financial assistance grant with the US Department of Energy`s (DOE) Energy Information Administration (EIA).

Historical evidence is presented for natural uranium series radioactive disequilibrium in uranium bearing soils in the Bargmann property area of karnes County on the Gulf Coastal Plain of south Texas. The early history of uranium exploration in the area is recounted and records of disequilibrium before milling and mining operations began are given. The property contains an open pit uranium mine associated with a larger ore body. In 1995, the US Department of Energy (DOE) directed Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) to evaluate the Bargmann tract for the presence of uranium mill tailings (ORNL 1996). There was a possibility that mill tailings had washed onto or blown onto the property from the former tailings piles in quantities that would warrant remediation under the Uranium Mill Tailings Remediation Action Project. Activity ratios illustrating disequilibrium between {sup 226}Ra and {sup 238}U in background soils during 1986 are listed and discussed. Derivations of uranium mass-to-activity conversion factors are covered in detail.

A habitat evaluation of the Weir property, an approximately 200-acre in holding of private property within the Little Pend Oreille National Wildlife Refuge (Refuge), was conducted using the Habitat Evaluation Procedures (HEP) methodology. The Weir property consists of two separate parcels, an upper unit of 40 acres and a 160-acre lower unit. Evaluation species were ruffed grouse and white-tailed deer. Life requisites evaluated were available browse for white-tailed deer and winter food and fall-to-spring cover for ruffed grouse. Field data were collected on October 16, 17, and 21, 1997. Approximately 37 acres of the lower 160-acre unit are currently grasslands with no shrub or tree cover, and therefore do not provide suitable ruffed grouse or white-tailed deer cover. They excluded this acreage from the HEP calculations for current conditions. This acreage was included in the HEP calculations for ruffed grouse after future management strategies were factored in. It was not included in projections for white-tailed deer. The entire property was stratified into 6 stands (2 in the upper unit and 4 in the lower unit) for data collection. Data were collected at 10 points, spaced 20 paces (approximately 16 m) apart along one randomly selected transect in each stand, for …

The Annual Energy Outlook 1998 (AEO98) is the first AEO with projections to 2020. Key issues for the forecast extension are trends in energy efficiency improvements, the effects of increasing production and productivity improvements on energy prices, and the reduction in nuclear generating capacity. Projections in AEO98 also reflect a greater shift to electricity market restructuring. Restructuring is addressed through several changes that are assumed to occur in the industry, including a shorter capital recovery period for capacity expansion decisions and a revised financial structure that features a higher cost of capital as the result of higher competitive risk. Both assumptions tend to favor less capital-intensive generation technologies, such as natural gas, over coal or baseload renewable technologies. The forecasts include specific restructuring plans in those regions that have announced plans. California, New York, and New England are assumed to begin competitive pricing in 1998. The provisions of the California legislation for stranded cost recovery and price caps are incorporated. In New York and New England, stranded cost recovery is assumed to be phased out by 2008.

The primary objective of this project is to enhance domestic petroleum production by demonstration and technology transfer of an advanced oil recovery technology in the Paradox basin, southeastern Utah. If this project can demonstrate technical and economic feasibility, the technique can be applied to approximately 100 additional small fields in the Paradox basin alone, and result in increased recovery of 150 to 200 million barrels of oil. This project is designed to characterize five shallow-shelf carbonate reservoirs in the Pennsylvanian (Desmoinesian) Paradox Formation and choose the best candidate for a pilot demonstration project for either a waterflood or carbon dioxide- (CO{sub 2}-) flood project. The field demonstration, monitoring of field performance, and associated validation activities will take place in the Paradox basin within the Navajo Nation. The results of this project will be transferred to industry and other researchers through a petroleum extension service, creation of digital databases for distribution, technical workshops and seminars, field trips, technical presentations at national and regional professional meetings, and publication in newsletters and various technical or trade journals.

This report describes the Characterization of Fracture-Matrix Interaction Along Fast Pathways in Welded Tuff, Yucca Mountain, Nevada.

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The treatment for some thyroid carcinomas involves surgically removing the thyroid gland and administering the radiopharmaceutical Sodium iodide-{sup 131}I (NaI). A diagnostic dose of NaI is given to the patient to determine if remnant tissue from the gland remains or larger doses are administered in order to treat the malignant tissue. Past research regarding NaI uptake and retention in euthyroid individuals (normal functioning thyroid) reveal that radioiodine concentrates mainly in the thyroid tissue and the remaining material is excreted from the body. The majority of radioiodine in athyroid (without thyroid) individuals is also eliminated from the body; however, there has been recent evidence of a long-term retention phase for individuals with no radioiodine concentrating tissue. The general purpose of this study was to develop a kinetic model and estimate the absorbed dose to athyroid individuals regarding the distribution and retention of NaI.

The authors present an improved comparison of the strong couplings of gluons to light (u, d, and s), c, and b quarks, determined from multijet rates in flavor-tagged samples of hadronic Z{sup 0} decays recorded with the SLC Large Detector at the SLAC Linear Collider between 1993 and 1995. Flavor separation on the basis of lifetime and decay multiplicity differences among hadrons containing light, c, and b quarks was made using the SLD precision tracking system, yielding tags with high purity and low bias against {ge} 3-jet final states. They find: {alpha}{sub s}{sup uds}/{alpha}{sub s}{sup all} = 0.997 {+-} 0.011(stat) {+-} 0.011(syst) {+-} 0.005(theory), {alpha}{sub s}{sup c}/{alpha}{sub s}{sup all} = 0.984 {+-} 0.042 {+-} 0.053 {+-} 0.022, {alpha}{sub s}{sup b}/{alpha}{sub s}{sup all} = 1.022 {+-} 0.019 {+-} 0.023 {+-} 0.012.