A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a legislative requirement, GAO presented the results of its audits of expenditures reported by seven offices of independent counsel for the 6 months ended September 30, 1998, focusing on whether the statements of expenditures complied with the financial reporting requirements of the law."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a legislative requirement, GAO provided information on the Department of Defense's (DOD) efforts to develop future warfighting capability, focusing on the: (1) status of DOD's efforts to implement its joint experimentation program; (2) factors that GAO believes contribute to the success of a joint experimentation program; and (3) extent of DOD's support for future warfighting."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a legislative requirement, GAO provided information on the status of efforts to implement personnel reductions in the Army Materiel Command (AMC) that were directed by the Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR), focusing on: (1) AMC's plans and timeframe for achieving the reductions; (2) the projected cost savings from such reductions; and (3) the cited impacts the reductions will have on workload and readiness."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the project approval process the Postal Service used in proposing to relocate postal operations for the Antelope Valley, California, area from the Main Post Office in Mojave, California, to a new facility in Lancaster, California."

A chapter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Internal Revenue Service's (IRS) program to audit income tax returns through correspondence, focusing on: (1) the number, results, and duration of correspondence audits as well as the characteristics of the audited returns; and (2) processes and requirements that IRS has had for years to govern correspondence audits."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed selected aspects of the Navy's management procedures for controlling items in transit, focusing on the: (1) reported value and types of inventory in transit within and between storage and repair activities, vendors, and end users that were unaccounted for (or lost); and (2) Navy's adherence to procedures for controlling such in-transit inventory."

A chapter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Department of Defense's (DOD) programs to develop laser weapons for missile defense, focusing on: (1) what laser weapons are being considered for missile defense and the coordination among the program offices developing the systems; (2) the status and cost of each system; and (3) the technical challenges each system faces as determined by DOD program managers and analysts and other laser system experts."

A chapter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on the status of federal agencies' research activities on indoor environmental air quality."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a legislative requirement, GAO reviewed the annual audited financial statements for 24 major departments and agencies of the U.S. government."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on the effectiveness of the Federal Communications Commission's (FCC) fee collection activities, focusing on: (1) FCC's controls for ensuring that required regulatory and application fees are paid; and (2) the extent to which FCC is collecting the civil monetary penalties resulting from its enforcement actions against entities that have violated its regulations."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on the Internal Revenue Service's (IRS) implementation of the Taxpayer Browsing Protection Act, focusing on: (1) actions IRS has taken to implement the law; and (2) the number of potential and proven incidents of unauthorized access by IRS employees that IRS has identified since enactment of the law, as well as penalties imposed in cases where unauthorized access was proven."

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The West Hackberry Tertiary Project is a field test of the concept that air injection can be combined with the Double Displacement Process to produce a tertiary recovery process that is both low cost and economic at current oil prices. The Double Displacement Process is the gas displacement of a water invaded oil column for the purpose of recovering tertiary oil by gravity drainage. In reservoirs with pronounced bed dip such as those found in West Hackberry and other Gulf Coast salt dome fields, reservoir performance has shown that gravity drainage recoveries average 80% to 90% of the original oil in place while waterdrive recoveries average 50% to 60% of the original oil in place. The target for tertiary oil recovery in the Double Displacement Process is the incremental oil between the 50% to 60% waterdrive recoveries and the 80% to 90% gravity drainage recoveries. In previous field tests, the Double Displacement Process has proven successful in generating tertiary oil recovery. The use of air injection in this process combines the benefits of air's low cost and universal accessibility with the potential for accelerated oil recovery from the combustion process. If successful, this project will demonstrate that utilizing air injection …

Results from a technology scanning and assessment project focused on the Chornobyl npp.

The Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant (PGDP) operated by the Department of Energy is challenged with selecting the appropriate remediation technology to cleanup contaminants at Waste Area Group (WAG) 6. This research utilizes value-focused thinking and multiattribute preference theory concepts to produce a decision analysis model designed to aid the decision makers in their selection process. The model is based on CERCLA's five primary balancing criteria, tailored specifically to WAG 6 and the contaminants of concern, utilizes expert opinion and the best available engineering, cost, and performance data, and accounts for uncertainty in contaminant volume. The model ranks 23 remediation technologies (trains) in their ability to achieve the CERCLA criteria at various contaminant volumes. A sensitivity analysis is performed to examine the effects of changes in expert opinion and uncertainty in volume. Further analysis reveals how volume uncertainty is expected to affect technology cost, time and ability to meet the CERCLA criteria. The model provides the decision makers with a CERCLA-based decision analysis methodology that is objective, traceable, and robust to support the WAG 6 Feasibility Study. In addition, the model can be adjusted to address other DOE contaminated sites.

This project is designed to develop a family of novel NO{sub x} control technologies, called Second Generation Advanced Reburning (SGAR) which has the potential to achieve 90+ NO{sub x} control in coal fired boilers at a significantly lower cost than Selective Catalytic Reduction. The ninth reporting period in Phase II (October 1-December 31, 1999) included preparation of the 10 x 10{sup 6} Btu/hr Tower Furnace for tests and setting the SGAR model to predict process performance under Tower Furnace conditions. Based on results of previous work, a paper has been prepared and submitted for the presentation at the 28 Symposium (International) on Combustion to be held at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland.

This report presents work carried out under contract DE-AC22-95PC95144 ''Combustion 2000 - Phase II.'' The goals of the program are to develop a coal-fired high performance power generation system (HIPPS) that is capable of: {lg_bullet} thermal efficiency (HHV) {ge} 47% {lg_bullet} NOx, SOx, and particulates {le} 10% NSPS (New Source Performance Standard) {lg_bullet} coal providing {ge} 65% of heat input {lg_bullet} all solid wastes benign {lg_bullet} cost of electricity {le} 90% of present plants Phase I, which began in 1992, focused on the analysis of various configurations of indirectly fired cycles and on technical assessments of alternative plant subsystems and components, including performance requirements, developmental status, design options, complexity and reliability, and capital and operating costs. Phase I also included preliminary R&D and the preparation of designs for HIPPS commercial plants approximately 300 MWe in size. Phase II, had as its initial objective the development of a complete design base for the construction and operation of a HIPPS prototype plant to be constructed in Phase III. As part of a descoping initiative, the Phase III program has been eliminated and work related to the commercial plant design has been ended. The rescoped program retained a program of engineering research and …

Combustion experiments were carried out on four different residual fuel oils in a 732 kW boiler. Particulate matter (PM) emission samples were separated aerodynamically by a cyclone into fractions that were nominally less than and greater than 2.5 microns in diameter. However, examination of several of the samples by computer-controlled scanning electron microscopy (CCSEM) revealed that part of the <2.5 micron fraction (PM{sub 2.5}) in fact consists of carbonaceous cenospheres and vesicular particles that range up to 10 microns in diameter. X-ray absorption fine structure (XAFS) spectroscopy data were obtained at the S, V, Ni, Fe, Cu, Zn, and As Kedges, and at the Pb L-edge. Deconvolution of the x-ray absorption near edge structure (XANES) region of the S spectra established that the dominant molecular forms of S present were sulfate (26-84% of total S) and thiophene (13-39% of total S). Sulfate was greater in the PM{sub 2.5} samples than in the >2.5 micron samples (PM{sub 2.5+}). Inorganic sulfides and elemental sulfur were present in lower percentages. The Ni XANES spectra from all of the samples agree fairly well with that of NiSO4, while most of the V spectra closely resemble that of vanadyl sulfate (VO{center_dot}SO{sub 4}{center_dot}xH{sub 2}O). The other …

A High Performance Power System (HIPPS) is being developed. This system is a coal-fired, combined cycle plant with indirect heating of gas turbine air. Foster Wheeler Development Corporation and a team consisting of Foster Wheeler Energy Corporation, Bechtel Corporation, University of Tennessee Space Institute and Westinghouse Electric Corporation are developing this system. In Phase 1 of the project, a conceptual design of a commercial plant was developed. Technical and economic analyses indicated that the plant would meet the goals of the project which include a 47 percent efficiency (HHV) and a 10 percent lower cost of electricity than an equivalent size PC plant. The concept uses a pyrolysis process to convert coal into fuel gas and char. The char is fired in a High Temperature Advanced Furnace (HITAF). The HITAF is a pulverized fuel-fired boiler/air heater where steam is generated and gas turbine air is indirectly heated. The fuel gas generated in the pyrolyzer is then used to heat the gas turbine air further before it enters the gas turbine. The project is currently in Phase 2 which includes engineering analysis, laboratory testing and pilot plant testing. Research and development is being done on the HIPPS systems that are not …

MORE is a consortium of educational, governmental, and industrial partners in cooperation with the state's Tribal colleges. Formed in 1994, the objectives are to develop and promote energy-related research and education in the state of Montana and the Northwestern region. Specifically, they set out to: (1) promote collaboration and cooperation among Montana's Colleges and Universities; (2) maximize use of existing personnel and resources; (3) foster partnerships with industries, state agencies, and tribal nations; and (4) enhance energy research and training. The 1st Implementation Grant consisted of Management and Coordination, Human Outreach, and two Research Clusters Petroleum Reservoir Characterization and Wind Energy. Overall, they consider this program to have been highly successful. That conclusion was mirrored by the DOE site reviewers, and by invitations from Dr. Matesh Varma, the DOE/EPSCoR National Program Director, to present their programs and outcomes as models for other states the National DOE/EPSCoR meetings.

The purpose of this analysis is to document the Quality Assurance (QA) classification of the Monitored Geologic Repository (MGR) site radiological monitoring system structures, systems and components (SSCs) performed by the MGR Safety Assurance Department. This analysis also provides the basis for revision of YMP/90-55Q, Q-List (YMP 1998). The Q-List identifies those MGR SSCs subject to the requirements of DOE/RW-0333P, ''Quality Assurance Requirements and Description'' (QARD) (DOE 1998).

In the United States alone there are 100 million gallons of high-level nuclear wastes (HLWs) in various chemical forms awaiting eventual disposal in geologic repositories. For safety in handling and transport from their present underground storage tanks to their final burial sites, much of the HLWs are being immobilized by vitrification. A further virtue of HLW vitrification is the fact that the glass may serve as an additional, non-geologic barrier to the dispersal of these radio-toxins into the environment. For this reason, one of the criteria for selecting HLW glass compositions has been chemical durability against attack by ground water. While the effects of radiation on chemical durability have therefore been studied extensively, little consideration has been given to the possibility that self-irradiation of HLW glasses may lead to modes of chemical decomposition which render them unstable even in the absence of exposure to ground water. The worst-case threat would occur if the HLW glasses were to respond to irradiation in ways analogous to rock salt (NaCl). It has long been known that alkali halides irradiated to

The purpose of this analysis is to document the Quality Assurance (QA) classification of the Monitored Geologic Repository (MGR) subsurface facility system structures, systems and components (SSCs) performed by the MGR Safety Assurance Department. This analysis also provides the basis for revision of YMP/90-55Q, Q-List (YMP 1998). The Q-List identifies those MGR SSCs subject to the requirements of DOE/RW-0333P, ''Quality Assurance Requirements and Description'' (QARD) (DOE 1998). This QA classification incorporates the current MGR design and the results of the ''Preliminary Preclosure Design Basis Event Calculations for the Monitored Geologic Repository'' (CRWMS M&O 1998a).

The purpose of this analysis is to document the Quality Assurance (QA) classification of the Monitored Geologic Repository (MGR) emergency response system structures, systems and components (SSCs) performed by the MGR Safety Assurance Department. This analysis also provides the basis for revision of YMP/90-55Q, Q-List (YMP 1998). The Q-List identifies those MGR SSCs subject to the requirements of DOE/RW-0333P7 ''Quality Assurance Requirements and Description'' (QARD) (DOE 1998).