INDEPENDENT VERIFICATION SURVEY REPORT FOR THE OPERABLE UNIT-1 LANDFILL TRENCHES, MIAMISBURG CLOSURE PROJECT, MIAMISBURG, OHIO DCN: 0468-SR-03-0

This report discusses commercial ties between the United States and the 27-member European Union. While ties between the U.S. and EU are substantial, growing, and mutually beneficial, differences in regulatory approaches limit an even more integrated marketplace from developing. To deal with this situation, a variety of government-to-government efforts have been created to dismantle existing regulatory barriers and to prevent new ones from emerging.

Presented in this report are radionuclide concentrations required as part of the program of qualifying Sludge Batch Six (SB6) for processing in the Defense Waste Processing Facility (DWPF). The SB6 material is currently in Tank 51 being washed and prepared for transfer to Tank 40. The acceptance evaluation needs to be completed prior to the transfer of the material in Tank 51 to Tank 40. The sludge slurry in Tank 40 has already been qualified for DWPF and is currently being processed as SB5. The radionuclide concentrations were measured or estimated in the Tank 51 SB6 Qualification Sample prepared at Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL). This sample was prepared from the three liter sample of Tank 51 sludge slurry (HTF-51-09-110) taken on October 8, 2009. The sample was delivered to SRNL where it was initially characterized in the Shielded Cells. Under the direction of the Liquid Waste Organization it was then modified by eight washes, nine decants, an addition of Pu from Canyon Tank 16.3, and an addition of NaNO{sub 2}. This final slurry now has a composition expected to be similar to that of the slurry in Tank 51 after final preparations have been made for transfer of that …

Samples of PUREX sludge from Tank 4 and HM sludge from Tank 12 were characterized in preparation for Sludge Batch 7 (SB7) formulation in Tank 51. SRNL analyses on Tank 4 and Tank 12 were requested in separate Technical Assistance Requests (TAR). The Tank 4 samples were pulled on January 19, 2010 following slurry operations by F-Tank Farm. The Tank 12 samples were pulled on February 9, 2010 following slurry operations by H-Tank Farm. At the Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL), two 200 mL dip samples of Tank 4 and two 200 mL dip samples of Tank 12 were received in the SRNL Shielded Cells. Each tank's samples were composited into clean 500 mL polyethylene storage bottles and weighed. The composited Tank 4 sample was 428.27 g and the composited Tank 12 sample was 502.15 g. As expected there are distinct compositional differences between Tank 4 and Tank 12 sludges. The Tank 12 slurry is much higher in Al, Hg, Mn, and Th, and much lower in Fe, Ni, S, and U than the Tank 4 slurry. The Tank 4 sludge definitely makes the more significant contribution of S to any sludge batch blend. This S, like that observed during …

This report discusses comprehensive food safety bills that are progressing in the 111th Congress and could affect farmers and ranchers. Interest in on-farm practices was renewed after more than 1,300 persons in 43 states, the District of Columbia, and Canada were found to be infected with the same unusual strain of bacteria (Salmonella Saintpaul) in April-July 2008.

The objective of the project was to study both theoretically and experimentally the excitation, recombination and transport properties required for nanostructured solar cells to deliver energy conversion efficiencies well in excess of conventional limits. These objectives were met by concentrating on three key areas, namely, investigation of physical mechanisms present in nanostructured solar cells, characterization of loss mechanisms in nanostructured solar cells and determining the properties required of nanostructured solar cells in order to achieve high efficiency and the design implications.

The goals of the proposed research as stated in the proposal were to: • Build a suite of one-dimensional initial models of different metallicities and central densities. • Using the improved flame capturing scheme, simulate the explosion of a white dwarf with embedded Lagrangian tracer particles, and post-process the thermal histories of the tracers to reconstruct the nucleosynthesis of the explosion. • Survey the effects of a changing progenitor metallicity on the isotopic yields. Of particular interest is 1) whether the linear relation between the mass of 56Ni synthesized and the pro- genitor metallicity is moderated by the effect of electron captures in the core; and 2) how a varying central density alters the relation between metallicity and 56Ni mass. • Using these results, examine how the observed metallicity distribution would affect the brightness distribution of SNe Ia and the isotopic ratios about the Fe-peak.

This report provides a legal overview of the regulatory structure of consumer finance under existing federal law, which is followed by an analysis of how the Consumer Financial Protection Act of 2010 will change this legal structure, with a focus on the Bureau's organization and funding; the entities and activities that fall (and do not fall) under the Bureau's supervisory, enforcement, and rulemaking authority; the Bureau's general and specific rulemaking powers and procedures; and an analysis of the act's preemption standards over state consumer protection laws as they apply to national banks and thrifts.

In this note, the authors examine the following hypothetical scenario: replacing existing 8-mm gap chambers with an in-vacuum undulator (IVU) one by one until they hit the boundary condition of 16-mA single-bunch operation. This is a continuation of a previous technical note on the topics of IVUs. The authors evaluated the impedance of IVU for various gaps. The result showed that the present 8-mm gap chamber can be replaced by the 8.754-mm IVU while maintaining the same 16-mA operational current. The estimates in this note make certain simplifying assumptions bearing on the effectiveness of nonlinear tapers. Subsequent evaluation of the effect of such tapers for APS parameters has cst considerable doubt on their usefulness. This results from the fact that APS has a fairly short electron bunch compared to the vacuum chamber dimensions. Investigation of other methods to decrease the impedance is on-going.

This report looks at the relationship between the U.S. and Thailand. This includes recent rivalries between populist political forces, nepotism in government, and Thai relationships with neighboring countries.

This report reviews the types of air emissions from livestock and poultry operations and their human health and environmental impacts. It then discusses provisions of several federal laws concerned with environmental impacts, beginning with the Clean Water Act, because protecting water resources has been the primary regulatory focus regarding livestock and animal operations.

This report identifies a number of issues receiving attention in connection with water infrastructure. It begins with a brief review of federal involvement, describes the debate about funding needs, and then examines key issues, including what is the nature of the problems to be solved; who will pay, and what is the federal role; and questions about mechanisms for delivering federal support, including state-by-state allotment. Recent congressional and Administration activity on these issues also is reviewed.

Substantial progress has been made toward understanding the fundamental physiology and genetics of wood decay fungi, microbes that are capable of degrading all major components of plant cell walls. Efficient utilization of lignocellulosic biomass has been hampered in part by limitations in our understanding of enzymatic mechanisms of plant cell wall degradation. This is particularly true of woody substrates where accessibility and high lignin content substantially complicate enzymatic 'deconstruction'. The interdisciplinary research has illuminated enzymatic mechanisms essential for the conversion of lignocellulosics to simple carbohydrates and other small molecular weight products. Progress was in large part dependent on substantial collaborations with the Department of Energy's Joint Genome Institute (JGI) in Walnut Creek and Los Alamos, as well as the Catholic University, Santiago, Chile, the Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, the University of Minnesota, St. Paul, and colleagues at the University of Wisconsin and the Forest Products Laboratory. Early accomplishments focused on the development of experimental tools (2, 7, 22, 24-26, 32) and characterization of individual genes and enzymes (1, 3-5, 8, 9, 11, 14, 15, 17, 18, 23, 27, 33). In 2004, the genome of the most intensively studied lignin-degrading fungus, Phanerochaete chrysosporium, was published (21). This milestone lead to …

The project proposed a commercial demonstration of advanced technologies that would capture and sequester CO2 emissions from an existing hydrogen production facility in an oil refinery into underground formations in combination with Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR). The project is led by Praxair, Inc., with other project participants: BP Products North America Inc., Denbury Onshore, LLC (Denbury), and Gulf Coast Carbon Center (GCCC) at the Bureau of Economic Geology of The University of Texas at Austin. The project is located at the BP Refinery at Texas City, Texas. Praxair owns and operates a large hydrogen production facility within the refinery. As part of the project, Praxair would construct a CO2 capture and compression facility. The project aimed at demonstrating a novel vacuum pressure swing adsorption (VPSA) based technology to remove CO2 from the Steam Methane Reformers (SMR) process gas. The captured CO2 would be purified using refrigerated partial condensation separation (i.e., cold box). Denbury would purchase the CO2 from the project and inject the CO2 as part of its independent commercial EOR projects. The Gulf Coast Carbon Center at the Bureau of Economic Geology, a unit of University of Texas at Austin, would manage the research monitoring, verification and accounting (MVA) …

A dipole-quadrupole electron-impact excitation model, consistent with molecular symmetry rules, is presented to fit ro-vibronic spectra of the hydrogen Fulcher-α Q-branch line emissions for passively measuring the rotational temperature of hydrogen neutral molecules in kinetic plasmas with the coronal equilibrium approximation. A quasi-rotational temperature and quadrupole contribution factor are adjustable parameters in the model. Quadrupole excitation is possible due to a violation of the 1st Born approximation for low to medium energy electrons (up to several hundred eV). The Born-Oppenheimer and Franck-Condon approximations are implicitly shown to hold. A quadrupole contribution of 10% is shown to fit experimental data at several temperatures from different experiments with electron energies from several to 100 eV. A convenient chart is produced to graphically determine the vibrational temperature of the hydrogen molecules from diagonal band intensities, if the ground state distribution is Boltzmann. Hydrogen vibrational modes are long-lived, surviving up to thousands of wall collisions, consistent with multiple other molecular dynamics computational results. The importance of inter-molecular collisions during a plasma pulse are also discussed.

This report summarizes the work performed at PNNL under the project Majorana Neutrinoless Double Beta Decay DUSEL R&D over the period of FY07-FY09.

In recent years, several Members of Congress have expressed interest in amending "Don't Ask, Don't Tell," (DADT) a legislation that requires those of homosexual orientation in the military to keep quiet about their orientation in order to maintain "morale, good order and discipline, and unit cohesion." At least two bills that would repeal the law and replace it with a policy of nondiscrimination on the basis of sexual orientation - H.R. 1283 and S. 3065 - have been introduced in the 111th Congress. This report provides a legal analysis of the various constitutional challenges that have been brought against DADT; for a policy analysis, see CRS Report R40782, "Don't Ask, Don't Tell": Military Policy and the Law on Same-Sex Behavior, by David F. Burrelli.

Currently, federal law prohibits states from granting unauthorized aliens certain postsecondary educational benefits on the basis of state residence, unless equal benefits are made available to all U.S. citizens. This prohibition is commonly understood to apply to the granting of "in-state" residency status for tuition purposes. In the 110th Congress, several bills that would amend this federal law have been introduced. Meanwhile, some states have passed laws aimed at making unauthorized state residents eligible for in-state tuition without violating this provision. This report provides a legal overview of cases involving immigrant access to higher education, as well as an analysis of the legality of state laws that make in-state tuition rates available to illegal immigrants.

This report provides a legal overview of cases involving immigrant access to higher education, as well as an analysis of the legality of state laws that make in-state tuition rates available to illegal aliens.

This report provides a definition of poverty and discusses the trends in poverty, poverty among selected groups, and the geography of poverty.

The report discusses selected litigation to demonstrate how those events have changed the campaign finance landscape and affected the policy issues that may confront Congress, but it is not a constitutional or legal analysis. Finally, campaign finance data appear throughout the report.

This report provides information on the amount of time taken to act on all Supreme Court nominations occurring between 1900 and 2010. It focuses on the actual amounts of time that Presidents and the Senate have taken to act after learning about vacancies, selections, etc. (as opposed to the elapsed time between official points in the process).

Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) has been conducting research for the United States Department of Energy, Energy Efficiency Renewable Energy, Biomass Program to investigate the feasibility of producing mixed alcohols from biomass-derived synthesis gas (syngas). This research has involved the screening of potential catalysts, and optimization of the more promising ones, using laboratory scale reactors. During 2009, the main goal of the testing program focused on optimizing selected supported catalysts containing rhodium (Rh) and manganese (Mn). Optimization involved examining different total concentrations and atomic ratios of Rh and Mn as well as that of the more promising promoters (Ir and Li) identified in the earlier screening studies. Evaluation of catalyst performance focused on attaining improvements with respect to the space-time-yield and converted carbon selectivity to C2+ oxygenates, with additional consideration given to the fraction of the oxygenates that were C2+ alcohols.

This report examines the current policies on the application of benefits to same-sex partners, analyzes the bills currently pending in the 111th Congress, and reviews the policy debate on extending benefits to same-sex partners. This report is about federal benefits for same-sex partners and not about same-sex relationships in general.