In this report OTA gives a broad overview of the qualities of the competing fuels and examines in depth some of the most contentious issues associated with the wisdom of active Federal support for introducing the fuels. Areas of uncertainty that affect the debate on Federal support include fuel cost (including costs of building new infrastructure and modifying vehicles); the air quality effects of the new fuels; effects on energy security; other environmental impacts of the fuels; and consumer acceptance of the changes in vehicle performance, refueling procedures, costs, and other facets of the transportation system that would follow a large-scale introduction of any of the fuels. The report singles out for special examination the arguments concerning the costs, energy security implications, and air quality impacts of introducing methanol fuels into the fleet.

This report market that have institutions, usually refered to as "clearing house", which handle both the clearing and some aspects of the settlement processes.

This report describes the unconventional cancer treatments that are most used by U.S. cancer patients; it describes the way in which people find out about them and how much they pay for them; reviews the claims made for them and the information base in support of the claims; suggests possible ways of generating valid information about their safety and effectiveness; and presents the legal issues surrounding unconventional treatments that have brought civil and criminal litigation to bear on the subject.

This report discusses the definition of honesty and integrity tests defined by OTA. The definition does not necessarily resolve ambiguities over the universe of tests that should be considered integrity tests. Controversy surrounds the meanings of integrity and honesty in the workplace; there is disagreement over whether integrity tests differ from other personnel tests in design or in the kinds of inferences they support; and there is little relative information on how integrity and honesty tests are actually used in hiring decisions.

This report focuses on the training given to employed workers both from the standpoint of the competitiveness of U.S. industry and from the standpoint of the individual worker who may need training to advance. Most workers who get training get it from their employer, and much of the report looks at the employer provided training system. The message of this report is that the debate about national training policies needs to be broadened to encompass not only training programs for the economically disadvantaged, the displaced worker, or people with special needs, but also those who stand on the front line of American productivity-employed workers at all levels.

This OTA report analyzes the problem of locating and arranging services for people with dementia, presents a framework for an effective system to connect them to appropriate services, and discusses congressional policy options for establishing such a system. One of the main policy issues is whether the system should serve people with dementia exclusively or serve people with other diseases and conditions as well.

This paper discusses briefly (1) the purposes of research directed toward support of the defense science and technology base and (2) criteria for judging government-supported, military oriented research portfolios. It will not cover, except tangentially, research into science and technology directed to civilian uses or the more advanced development phase of military weapons and systems.

This report evaluates past RPA efforts, reviews the process used by the Forest Service in preparing the 1989 RPA Assessment and the Draft 1990 RPA Program, and identities options for improving RPA’s contribution to long-range planning and to policy and budget deliberations. The second OTA report on Forest Service planning will review national forest planning, and will examine the relationship between national planning under RPA and forest planning under NFMA.

OTA prepared this report with the assistance of a panel of advisors and reviewers selected for their expertise and diverse points of view on the issues covered by the assessment. These authorities were drawn from academia, industry, and professional societies, as well as Federal, State, and local agencies. They included members of the scientific, law enforcement, forensic, and legal communities. OTA gratefully acknowledges the contribution of each of these individuals; as with all OTA reports, responsibility for the content is OTA’s alone.

A report on royalty, rental, and bonus payments from non-fuel mineral leases on public lands are a oil and gas and other fuel and major source of income for the Federal government, States, and Indian Tribes.

This background paper assesses the effects of information technology on securities markets and the current status of global securities trading. It compares securities markets and clearing and settlement mechanisms in Japan, the United Kingdom, and the rest of Europe with those in the United States. Finally it identities emerging questions about international markets and national regulatory regimes.

A report on High Definition Television (HDTV. During 1989, HDTV moved from obscurity to center stage in the ongoing debate over the role of the Federal Government in U.S. industrial competitiveness. HDTV and related High-Resolution System (HRS) technologies in the computer and communications sectors may significantly impact U.S. electronics manufacturing, accelerate fundamental restructuring of the U.S. communications infrastructure, and provide a host of valuable services.

This background paper examines the epidemiologic evidence used by the CDC in deciding to revise the AIDS case definition and the impact the proposed definition will have on surveillance. The paper also explores the logistical consequences and other implications of the revised definition, including its impact on Social Security disability determinations.

The background paper extends the analysis of energy use into new areas by explicitly looking at how energy use has changed with the expansion of the service sector, the explosion of international trade, and greater complexity of the U.S. economy as the structure of businesses changed in response to new technologies and competitive challenges. The increasing sophistication of the U.S. economy means that the role of energy is less likely to be directly identified and is instead more likely to be an indirect factor that was added many steps before in the complex network that connects producer to consumer. This report explicitly separates direct from indirect energy use.

This Special Report assesses how Federal scientific and technical information (STI) can contribute to a more competitive America and what actions are needed to realize this potential. The report was prepared in response to a request from the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology.

This report offers an analysis of the vulnerability of electric power system specific equipment which is included in a separate appendix that is under classification review by the Department of Energy. This appendix will be made available only under appropriate safeguards by the Department of Energy.

This is OTA’S fifth report on U.S. foreign aid and African agriculture and our most detailed look at one specific problem. The report provides a background on the unusual nature of grasshopper and locust problems, examine t e implications this has for the way problems are treated, then consider how U.S. contributions to the bilateral and multilateral control effort might be improved.

This Special Report is the frost product of OTA assessment of international collaboration in defense technology. It provides an overview of the subject and analyzes the impact that changes in the environment of defense technology and reduced East-West tensions will exert on defense industrial cooperation and associated alliance relations.

Policy interest in Medicare’s payment policies regarding recombinant erythropoietin has arisen chiefly because of the biologic’s expense. Because of concern about the implications of recombinant erythropoietin use for Medicare expenditures, the House Ways and Means Committee, Subcommittee on Health, requested OTA to examine alternative payment policies that Medicare might adopt to pay for the biologic. In responding to that request, this Special Report reviews clinical and economic issues regarding the use of recombinant erythropoietin and develops a series of options for Congressional consideration.

This report is the final, summarizing report in a series of products from a broad assessment of space transportation technologies undertaken by OTA for the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, and the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology.

This is the second of two OTA assessments on the subject of high-temperature superconductivity (HTS). As the title suggests, this study attempts to put HTS in perspective, both in terms of competing technologies (e.g., the more mature low-temperature superconductors), and in terms of the many technical and economic problems that must be overcome before HTS can be widely used.

The House Committee on Government Operations, Subcommittee on Human Resources and Intergovernmental Relations asked the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) to document the extent to which federally funded research on AIDS/HIV has contributed to advances in other fields including biomedical and behavior research, prevention, patient care, and health care financing. In response to this request OTA conducted a survey of distinguished biomedical and social scientists. This Staff Paper reports on the results of that survey.

This Report, the first of the neuroscience series, discusses the risks posed by neurotoxic substances—substances that can adversely affect the nervous system—and evaluates the Federal research and regulatory programs now in place to address these risks.

For this report OTA compiled time-series data provided by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Federal mission agencies on proposals for competitively awarded research projects, and by the American Association for the Advancement of Science’s (AAAS) annual R&D budget series.7 These funding trends, presented below, suggest changes over the decade of the 1980s and raise some issues for future policy study.