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This final report describes the work done under the sponsorship of the U.S. DOE for the support of advanced fossil resource utilization research at historically black colleges and universities, Grant No. DE-Ps22-92MT920 on "Investigation of Combined S02/NOx Removal by Ceria Sorbents". The work was conducted at the Department of Chemical Engineering of Hampton University. The industrial partner was Malcolm Pirnie,Inc. Environmental Engineers, Scientists and Planners, who handled the metal analysis and XRD measurements on the solid sorbents; they have also supplied the flyash used in the experimental program. The development of a commercial process concept, economic analysis, and evaluation of process alternatives were undertaken by TECOGEN of Waltham, MA.

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The ongoing advances in Microelectromechanical Systems (MEMS) are providing man-kind the freedom to travel to dimensional spaces never before conceivable. Advances include new fabrication processes, new materials, tailored modeling tools, new fabrication machines, systems integration, and more detailed studies of physics and surface chemistry as applied to the micro scale. In the ten years since its inauguration, MEMS technology is penetrating industries of automobile, healthcare, biotechnology, sports/entertainment, measurement systems, data storage, photonics/optics, computer, aerospace, precision instruments/robotics, and environment monitoring. It is projected that by the turn of the century, MEMS will impact every individual in the industrial world, totaling sales up to $14 billion (source: System Planning Corp.). MEMS programs in major universities have spawned up all over the United States, preparing the brain-power and expertise for the next wave of MEMS breakthroughs. It should be pointed out that although MEMS has been initiated by electrical engineering researchers through the involvement of IC fabrication techniques, today it has evolved such that it requires a totally multi-disciplinary team to develop useful devices. Mechanical engineers are especially crucial to the success of MEMS development, since 90% of the physical realm involved is mechanical. Mechanical engineers are needed for the design of MEMS, …

Autothermal fuel reforming (ATR) consists of reacting a hydrocarbon fuel such as natural gas or diesel with steam to produce a hydrogen-rich {open_quotes}reformed{close_quotes} fuel. This work has been designed to investigate the fuel reformation and the product gas combustion under gas turbine conditions. The hydrogen-rich gas has a high flammability with a wide range of combustion stability. Being lighter and more reactive than methane, the hydrogen-rich gas mixes readily with air and can be burned at low fuel/air ratios producing inherently low emissions. The reformed fuel also has a low ignition temperature which makes low temperature catalytic combustion possible. ATR can be designed for use with a variety of alternative fuels including heavy crudes, biomass and coal-derived fuels. When the steam required for fuel reforming is raised by using energy from the gas turbine exhaust, cycle efficiency is improved because of the steam and fuel chemically recuperating. Reformation of natural gas or diesel fuels to a homogeneous hydrogen-rich fuel has been demonstrated. Performance tests on screening various reforming catalysts and operating conditions were conducted on a batch-tube reactor. Producing over 70 percent of hydrogen (on a dry basis) in the product stream was obtained using natural gas as a feedstock. …

Catalytic gasification of coal to produce H{sub 2}-, CO-, and CH{sub 4}-rich mixtures of gases for consumption in molten carbonate fuel cells is currently under development; however, to optimize the fuel cell performance and extend its operating life,it is desired to separate as much of the inert components (i.e., CO{sub 2} and N{sub 2}) and impurities (i.e., H{sub 2}S and NH{sub 3}) as possible from the fuel gas before it enters the fuel cell. In addition, the economics of the integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) can be improved by separating as much of the hydrogen as possible from the fuel, since hydrogen is a high-value product. Researchers at the Energy & Environmental Research Center and Bend Research, Inc., investigated pressure-driven membranes as a method for accomplishing this gas separation and hot-gas cleanup. These membranes are operated at temperatures as high as 800{degrees}C and at pressures up to 300 psig. They have very small pore sizes that separate the undesirable gases by operating in the Knudsen diffusion region of mass transport (30 -50{Angstrom}) or in the molecular sieving region of mass transport phenomena (<5{Angstrom}). In addition, H{sub 2} separation through a palladium metal membrane proceeds via a solution-diffusion mechanism for atomic …

A new 14 GHz ECRIS has been designed and built over the last 2 years. The source, a modification of the Berkeley AECR, incorporates the latest results from ECR developments to produce intense beams of highly charged ions, i.e., an improved electron confinement with an axial magnetic mirror ratio of 3.5 and a radial magnetic field inside the plasma chamber of 1.0 T. The aluminium plasma chamber and extraction electrode as well as a biased disk on axis at the microwave injection side donate additional electrons to the plasma, making use of the large secondary electron yield from Al oxide. Slots in the plasma chamber allow for radial pumping which increases the AECR performance. The source will also be capable of additional ECR plasma heating using two frequencies simultaneously to increase the electron energy gain for producing high charge states. To be able to deliver usable intensities of the heaviest ion beams, the design will also allow for axial access for metal evaporation ovens and solid material samples using plasma sputtering. Main design goal is to produce several e{mu}A of U{sup 34+} in order to obtain Coulomb- barrier energies from ATLAS without further stripping.

These tests simulated the West Valley (WV) tank heel removal flowsheet in which oxalic acid solution (OAS) is used to elute Cs from zeolite in tank 8D-1 for 28 h. The eluent is then transferred to tank 8D-2, to dissolve the waste sludge heel. Sequence for the tests were: elute 10 g of Cs-loaded zeolite for 28 h at 50 C at 40 L/kg- zeolite, using 8 wt% OAS; decant used OAS and add 240 g waste slurry simulant, which was washed to <2g/L dissolved solids and containing 120-140 g total oxides/L; let the 3 test combinations (various Fe{sub 2}O{sub 3}) and control age at 50 C for 50 h; and after adjusting pH from 2.5 to 5, sampling at 0.25 to 16 h. Results include visual and analyses; data tables include compositions of the OAS after the Cs- zeolite contact, Cs eluted, supernate OAS in contact with sludge, and neutralized tests. Data have also been graphed for each element vs contact time. Cs elution data was consistent with >90% eluted; the OA conc. after Cs elution was also consistent with essentially no acid consumption. During contact with OAS at pH 2.5, the solution appears to have come into equilibrium …

Fluorescence is a powerful technique that has potential uses in detection and characterization of biological aerosols both in the battlefield and in civilian environments. Fluorescence techniques can be used with ultraviolet (UV) light detection and ranging (LIDAR) equipment to detect biological aerosol clouds at a distance, to provide early warning of a biological attack, and to track an potentially noxious cloud. Fluorescence can also be used for detection in a point sensor to monitor biological materials and to distinguish agents from benign aerosols. This work is part of a continuing program by the Army`s Chemical and Biological Defense Command to characterized the optical properties of biological agents. Reported here are ultraviolet fluorescence measurements of Bacillus megaterium and Bacillus Globigii aerosols suspended in an electrodynamic particle trap. Fluorescence spectra of a common atmospheric aerosol, pine pollen, are also presented.

Anomalous transport is investigated for the Standard Map. A chain of exact self similar islands in the vicinity of the period 5 accelerator island is found for a particular value of the map parameter. The transport is found to be superdiffusive with an anomalous exponent related to the characteristic temporal and spatial scaling parameters of the island chain. The value of the transport exponent is compared to the theory. The escape time distribution and Poincare recurrence distribution are found to have power-like tails and the corresponding exponents are obtained and compared to the theory.

Objective is to use {sup 129}Xe NMR to study the microporous structure of coals. During this quarter, we have: performed a presaturation experiment on Wyodak subbituminous coal, monitored the progress of Xe adsorption in an anthracite, focusing on the changes observed in the external-surface adsorbed gas signal, used an echo sequence to obtain {sup 129}Xe NMR spectra of Blind Canyon hvAb coal, and improved and repeated the successive oxygen adsorption and desorption experiment on a microporous carbon.

A natural single crystal of ilmenite was irradiated at 100 K with 200 keV Ar{sup 2+}. Rutherford backscattering spectroscopy and ion channeling with 2 MeV He{sup +} ions were used to monitor damage accumulation in the surface region of the implanted crystal. At an irradiation fluence of 1 {times} 10{sup 15} Ar{sup 2+} cm{sup {minus}2}, considerable near-surface He{sup +} ion dechanneling was observed, to the extent that ion yield from a portion of the aligned crystal spectrum reached the yield level of a random spectrum. This observation suggests that the near-surface region of the crystal was amorphized by the implantation. Cross-sectional transmission electron microscopy and electron diffraction on this sample confirmed the presence of a 150 mm thick amorphous layer. These results are compared to similar investigations on geikielite (MgTiO{sub 3}) and spinel (MgAl{sub 2}O{sub 4}) to explore factors that may influence radiation damage response in oxides.

Interdiffusion experiments have been conducted to investigate the compatibility of various austenitic stainless steels with U-Pu-Zr alloys, which are alloys to be employed as fuel for the Integral Fast Reactor being developed by Argonne National Laboratory. These tests have also studied the compatibility of austenitic stainless steels with fission products, like the minor actinides (Np and Am) and lanthanides (Ce and Nd), that are generated during the fission process in an IFR. This paper compares the results of these investigations in the context of fuel-cladding compatibility in IFR fuel elements, specifically focusing on the relative Interdiffusion behavior of the components and the types of phases that develop based on binary phase diagrams. Results of Interdiffusion tests are assessed in the light of observations derived from post-test examinations of actual irradiated fuel elements.

This is the final report of a one-year, Laboratory-Directed Research and Development (LDRD) project at the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL). This project sought to develop a next-generation magnetic nozzle. The project engaged the fundamental physics of plasma- magnetic field interactions to attain plasma accelerator control that is significantly more advanced than the present state-of-the-art. Central to next-generation magnetic nozzle design and development is the ability to precisely predict the interaction of flowing magnetized plasma with self-generated and applied magnetic fields. This predictive capability must order physical processes in a way that preserves accuracy while allowing for the rapid evaluation of many different nozzle configurations. Large, ``off-the-shelf``, numerical codes are not well suited to nozzle design applications in that they lack the necessary non-ideal physics and are not well disposed to rapid design evaluation. For example, we know that both non-ideal magnetohydrodynamic effects, such as Hall drifts and finite ion- gyro-radius kinetics, are important constituents of magnetic nozzle performance. We built a special purpose code to allow system design.

We explore the possibility of using a simple detector to determine the direction or heading toward a source of nuclear radiation, typically penetrating neutrons or gamma rays. The technique is based on the attenuation of incident radiation across a scintillator that has been segmented so that differences between the count rates provide the orthogonal components of the local radiation vector. A number of simple measurements are carried out using plutonium, californium, and gamma-ray sources at distances of 1-20 m, with results that are in good agreement with earlier Monte Carlo predictions. In addition, triangulation allows the distance to the source to be estimated by correlating the observations from two or more detectors. These initial studies suggest that directional detectors may be useful in applications such as searching for nuclear materials or monitoring the location of radiation sources in storage vaults.

Parallelism for gray participating media radiation heat transfer may be placed in two primary categories: spatial and angular domain-based parallelism. Angular, e.g., ray based, decomposition has received the greatest attention in the open literature for moderate sized applications where the entire geometry may be placed on processor. Angular based decomposition is limited, however, for large scale applications (O(10{sup 6}) to O(10{sup 8}) computational cells) given the memory required to store computational grids of this size on each processor. Therefore, the objective of this work is to examine the application of spatial domain-based parallelism to large scale, three-dimensional, participating-media radiation transport calculations using a massively parallel supercomputer architecture. Both scaled and fixed problem size efficiencies are presented for an application of the Discrete Ordinate method to a three dimensional, non-scattering radiative transport application with nonuniform absorptivity. The data presented shows that the spatial domain-based decomposition paradigm results in some degradation in the parallel efficiency but provides useful speedup for large computational grids.

This eighth quarterly report summarizes activity from July 1, 1996 through September 30, 1996. The report is organized in sections describing background information and work performed under the main work breakdown structure (WBS) categories. The WBS categories included are fuel processor, fuel cell stack, and system integration and controls. Program scheduling and task progress are presented in the appendix.

This is the final report of a three-year, Laboratory-Directed Research and Development (LDRD) project at the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL). The project was a study of turbulence in fluids that are subject to different body forces and to external temperature gradients. Our focus was on the recent theoretical prediction that the Kolomogorov picture of turbulence may need to be modified for turbulent flows driven by buoyancy and subject to body forces such as rotational accelerations. Models arising from this research are important in global climate modeling, in turbulent transport problems, and in the fundamental understanding of fluid turbulence. Experimentally, we use (1) precision measurements of heat transport and local temperature; (2) flow visualization using digitally- enhanced optical shadowgraphs, particle-image velocimetry, thermochromic liquid-crystal imaging, laser-doppler velocimetry, and photochromic dye imaging; and (3) advanced image- processing techniques. Our numerical simulations employ standard spectral and novel lattice Boltzmann algorithms implemented on parallel Connection Machine computers to simulate turbulent fluid flow. In laboratory experiments on incompressible fluids, we measure probability distribution functions and two-point spatial correlations of temperature T and velocity V (both T-T and V-T correlations) and determine scaling relations for global heat transport with Rayleigh number. We also explore the mechanism …

The Cross-Section Evaluation Working Group (CSEWG) is a long-standing committee charged with the responsibility for organizing and overseeing the U.S. cross-section evaluation effort. It`s main product is the official U.S. evaluated nuclear data file, ENDF. The current version of this file is Version VI. All evaluations included in ENDF are reviewed and approved by CSEWG and issued by the U.S. Nuclear Data Center, Brookhaven National Laboratory. CSEWG is comprised of volunteers from the U.S. nuclear data community who possess expertise in evaluation methodologies and who collectively have been responsible for producing most of the evaluations included in ENDF. In 1992 CSEWG added the Measurements Committee to its list of standing committees and subcommittees. This action was based on a recognition of the importance of experimental data in the evaluation process as well as the realization that measurement activities in the U.S. were declining at an alarming rate and needed all possible encouragement to avoid the loss of this resource. The mission of the Committee is to maintain a network of experimentalists in the U.S. that would provide needed encouragement to the national nuclear data measurement effort through improved communication and facilitation of collaborative activities. In 1994, an additional charge was …

DOE`s FY 1996 budget of $18 billion included $1.1 billion for construction projects; ensuring that these projects meet bonafide existing or future DOE needs becomes increasingly important as DOE`s missions evolve and its organization changes. In 1994 and 1995, IG issued several reports expressing concerns about the construction planning process and questioned whether planned construction was necessary to meet mission needs. The reports also pointed out that DOE did not ensure that originally identified needs were still valid several years after a project`s conception. (The problems identified were at single locations.) While DOE management did not agree with all aspects of the audit reports, it canceled or downsized several projects and initiated a number of process improvements to enhance the construction planning process. Purpose of this report is to synthesize issues from these prior reports to assist management in focusing process improvement efforts to avoid construction of unneeded or oversized facilities.

Cartesian grid methods encompass a wide variety of techniques used to solve partial differential equations in more than one space dimension on uniform Cartesian grids even when the underlying geometry is complex and not aligned with the grid. The authors` groups work on Immersed Interface Methods (IIM) was originally motivated by the desire to understand and improve the ``Immersed Boundary Method``, developed by Charles Peskin to solve incompressible Navier-Stokes equations in complicated geometries with moving elastic boundaries. This report briefly discusses the development of the Immersed Interface Methods and gives examples of application of the method in solving several partial differential equations.

Over the past two quarters, our work has focused on three main areas. The first area of interest involved a reexamination of the rate laws that were formed in past quarters. A possible error was discovered for the analytical methods used in the o-cresol oxidation study and the data were corrected, yielding a new rate equation. The data for hydroxybenzaldehydes were studied again, this time as a system of parallel oxidation and thermolysis reactions. The second area in which progress was made was the study of the thermolysis of nitrophenols and dihydroxybenzenes in supercritical water. These investigations were needed to determine the effect that pyrolysis or hydrolysis had on our previous supercritical water oxidation experiments. Thirdly, we have continued to investigate the use of molecular orbital theory in the determination reactivity indices. A reactivity index, such as the enthalpy of formation, may be used in a structure-reactivity relationship to summarize the kinetics for the oxidation of phenolics in supercritical water. Progress in each of these areas is summarized.

Exciting opportunities exist for the application of supercritical fluid (SCF) reactions for the pre-treatment of coal. Utilizing reactants which resemble the organic nitrogen containing components of coal, we propose to develop a method to tailor chemical reactions in supercritical fluid solvents for the specific application of coal denitrogenation. The tautomeric equilibrium of a Schiff base was chosen as the model system and was investigated in supercritical ethane and cosolvent modified supercritical ethane.

The corrections system in the U.S. is supervising over five million offenders. This number is rising fast and so are the direct and indirect costs to society. To improve supervision and reduce the cost of parole and probation, first generation home arrest systems were introduced in 1987. While these systems proved to be helpful to the corrections system, their scope is rather limited because they only cover an offender at a single location and provide only a partial time coverage. To correct the limitations of first-generation systems, second-generation wide area continuous electronic offender monitoring systems, designed to monitor the offender at all times and locations, are now on the drawing board. These systems use radio frequency location technology to track the position of offenders. The challenge for this technology is the development of reliable personal locator devices that are small, lightweight, with long operational battery life, and indoors/outdoors accuracy of 100 meters or less. At the center of a second-generation system is a database that specifies the offender`s home, workplace, commute, and time the offender should be found in each. The database could also define areas from which the offender is excluded. To test compliance, the system would compare the …