During the period April to June 2008, at the behest of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) National Nuclear Security Administration, Nevada Site Office (NNSA/NSO); the Desert Research Institute (DRI) constructed and deployed two portable environmental monitoring stations at the Tonopah Test Range (TTR) as part of the Environmental Restoration Project Soils Sub-Project. The TTR is located within the boundaries of the Nevada Test and Training Range (NTTR) near the northern edge, and covers an area of approximately 725.20 km2 (179,200 acres). The primary objective of the monitoring stations is to evaluate whether and under what conditions there is wind transport of radiological contaminants from one of the three Soil Sub-Project Corrective Action Units (CAUs) associated with Operation Roller Coaster on TTR. Operation Roller Coaster was a series of tests, conducted in 1963, designed to examine the stability and dispersal of plutonium in storage and transportation accidents. These tests did not result in any nuclear explosive yield. However, the tests did result in the dispersal of plutonium and contamination of surface soils in the surrounding area.

Data was taken with the NASA ER-2 aircraft with the Cloud Radar System and other instruments in conjunction with the DOE ARM CLASIC field campaign. The flights were near the SGP site in north Central Oklahoma and targeted small developing convection. The CRS is a 94 GHz nadir pointing Doppler radar. Also on board the ER-2 was the Cloud Physics Lidar (CPL). Seven science flights were conducted but the weather conditions did not cooperate in that there was neither developing convection, or there was heavy rain.

The representative concentration pathway to be delivered is a scenario of atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases and other radiatively important atmospheric species, along with land-use changes, derived from the Global Change Assessment Model (GCAM). The particular representative concentration pathway (RCP) that the Joint Global Change Research Institute (JGCRI) has been responsible for is a not-to-exceed pathway that stabilizes at a radiative forcing of 4.5Wm-2 in the year 2100.

The Flooding Predictor™ is a patented advanced control technology proven in research at the Separations Research Program, University of Texas at Austin, to increase distillation column throughput by over 6%, while also increasing energy efficiency by 10%. The research was conducted under a U. S. Department of Energy Cooperative Agreement awarded to George Dzyacky of 2ndpoint, LLC. The Flooding Predictor™ works by detecting the incipient flood point and controlling the column closer to its actual hydraulic limit than historical practices have allowed. Further, the technology uses existing column instrumentation, meaning no additional refining infrastructure is required. Refiners often push distillation columns to maximize throughput, improve separation, or simply to achieve day-to-day optimization. Attempting to achieve such operating objectives is a tricky undertaking that can result in flooding. Operators and advanced control strategies alike rely on the conventional use of delta-pressure instrumentation to approximate the column’s approach to flood. But column delta-pressure is more an inference of the column’s approach to flood than it is an actual measurement of it. As a consequence, delta pressure limits are established conservatively in order to operate in a regime where the column is never expected to flood. As a result, there is much “left …

Metric for Quarter 4: Report results of implementation of composite parameterization in single-column model (SCM) to explore the dependency of drizzle formation on aerosol properties. To better represent VOCALS conditions during a test flight, the Liu-Duam-McGraw (LDM) drizzle parameterization is implemented in the high-resolution Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model, as well as in the single-column Community Atmosphere Model (CAM), to explore this dependency.

Metric for Quarter 3: Report comparisons of aerosol/CCN relationship parameterizations with data collected in the first quarter and best parameterization for VOCALS data set.

Broad Funding Opportunity Announcement Project: FastCAP is improving the performance of an ultracapacitor—a battery-like electronic device that can complement, and possibly even replace, an HEV or EV battery pack. Ultracapacitors have many advantages over conventional batteries, including long lifespans (over 1 million cycles, as compared to 10,000 for conventional batteries) and better durability. Ultracapacitors also charge more quickly than conventional batteries, and they release energy more quickly. However, ultracapacitors have fallen short of batteries in one key metric: energy density—high energy density means more energy storage. FastCAP is redesigning the ultracapacitor’s internal structure to increase its energy density. Ultracapacitors traditionally use electrodes made of irregularly shaped, porous carbon. FastCAP’s ultracapacitors are made of tiny, aligned carbon nanotubes. The nanotubes provide a regular path for ions moving in and out of the ultracapacitor’s electrode, increasing the overall efficiency and energy density of the device.

GRIDS Project: Fluidic is developing a low-cost, rechargeable, high-power module for Zinc-air batteries that will be used to store renewable energy. Zinc-air batteries are traditionally found in small, non-rechargeable devices like hearing aids because they are well-suited to delivering low levels of power for long periods of time. Historically, Zinc-air batteries have not been as useful for applications which require periodic bursts of power, like on the electrical grid. Fluidic hopes to fill this need by combining the high energy, low cost, and long run-time of a Zinc-air battery with new chemistry providing high power, high efficiency, and fast response. The battery module could allow large grid-storage batteries to provide much more power on very short demand—the most costly kind of power for utilities—and with much more versatile performance.

GRIDS Project: LBNL is designing a flow battery for grid storage that relies on a hydrogen-bromine chemistry which could be more efficient, last longer and cost less than today’s lead-acid batteries. Flow batteries are fundamentally different from traditional lead-acid batteries because the chemical reactants that provide their energy are stored in external tanks instead of inside the battery. A flow battery can provide more energy because all that is required to increase its storage capacity is to increase the size of the external tanks. The hydrogen-bromine reactants used by LBNL in its flow battery are inexpensive, long lasting, and provide power quickly. The cost of the design could be well below $100 per kilowatt hour, which would rival conventional grid-scale battery technologies.

Broad Funding Opportunity Announcement Project: Ceres is developing bigger and better grasses for use in biofuels. The bigger the grass yield, the more biomass, and more biomass means more biofuel per acre. Using biotechnology, Ceres is developing grasses that will grow bigger with less fertilizer than current grass varieties. Hardier, higher-yielding grass also requires less land to grow and can be planted in areas where other crops can’t grow instead of in prime agricultural land. Ceres is conducting multi-year trials in Arizona, Texas, Tennessee, and Georgia which have already resulted in grass yields with as much as 50% more biomass than yields from current grass varieties.

Hydraulic conductivities of volcanic and carbonate lithologic units at the Nevada Test Site were estimated from flow logs and aquifer-test data. Borehole flow and drawdown were integrated and interpreted using a radial, axisymmetric flow model, AnalyzeHOLE. This integrated approach is used because complex well completions and heterogeneous aquifers and confining units produce vertical flow in the annular space and aquifers adjacent to the wellbore. AnalyzeHOLE simulates vertical flow, in addition to horizontal flow, which accounts for converging flow toward screen ends and diverging flow toward transmissive intervals. Simulated aquifers and confining units uniformly are subdivided by depth into intervals in which the hydraulic conductivity is estimated with the Parameter ESTimation (PEST) software. Between 50 and 150 hydraulic-conductivity parameters were estimated by minimizing weighted differences between simulated and measured flow and drawdown. Transmissivity estimates from single-well or multiple-well aquifer tests were used to constrain estimates of hydraulic conductivity. The distribution of hydraulic conductivity within each lithology had a minimum variance because estimates were constrained with Tikhonov regularization. AnalyzeHOLE simulated hydraulic-conductivity estimates for lithologic units across screened and cased intervals are as much as 100 times less than those estimated using proportional flow-log analyses applied across screened intervals only. Smaller estimates of …

GRIDS Project: USC is developing an iron-air rechargeable battery for large-scale energy storage that could help integrate renewable energy sources into the electric grid. Iron-air batteries have the potential to store large amounts of energy at low cost—iron is inexpensive and abundant, while oxygen is freely obtained from the air we breathe. However, current iron-air battery technologies have suffered from low efficiency and short life spans. USC is working to dramatically increase the efficiency of the battery by placing chemical additives on the battery’s iron-based electrode and restructuring the catalysts at the molecular level on the battery’s air-based electrode. This can help the battery resist degradation and increase life span. The goal of the project is to develop a prototype iron-air battery at significantly cost lower than today’s best commercial batteries.

Broad Funding Opportunity Announcement Project: Foro Energy is developing a unique capability and hardware system to transmit high power lasers over long distances via fiber optic cables. This laser power is integrated with a mechanical drilling bit to enable rapid and sustained penetration of hard rock formations too costly to drill with mechanical drilling bits alone. The laser energy that is directed at the rock basically softens the rock, allowing the mechanical bit to more easily remove it. Foro Energy’s laser-assisted drill bits have the potential to be up to 10 times more economical than conventional hard-rock drilling technologies, making them an effective way to access the U.S. energy resources currently locked under hard rock formations.

Electrofuels Project: MIT is using solar-derived hydrogen and common soil bacteria called Ralstonia eutropha to turn carbon dioxide (CO2) directly into biofuel. This bacteria already has the natural ability to use hydrogen and CO2 for growth. MIT is engineering the bacteria to use hydrogen to convert CO2 directly into liquid transportation fuels. Hydrogen is a flammable gas, so the MIT team is building an innovative reactor system that will safely house the bacteria and gas mixture during the fuel-creation process. The system will pump in precise mixtures of hydrogen, oxygen, and CO2, and the online fuel-recovery system will continuously capture and remove the biofuel product.

Electrofuels Project: NC State is working with the University of Georgia to create Electrofuels from primitive organisms called extremophiles that evolved before photosynthetic organisms and live in extreme, hot water environments with temperatures ranging from 167-212 degrees Fahrenheit The team is genetically engineering these microorganisms so they can use hydrogen to turn carbon dioxide directly into alcohol-based fuels. High temperatures are required to distill the biofuels from the water where the organisms live, but the heat-tolerant organisms will continue to thrive even as the biofuels are being distilled—making the fuel-production process more efficient. The microorganisms don’t require light, so they can be grown anywhere—inside a dark reactor or even in an underground facility.

Electrofuels Project: MUSC is developing an engineered system to create liquid fuels from communities of interdependent microorganisms. MUSC is first pumping carbon dioxide (CO2) and renewable sources of electricity into a battery-like cell. A community of microorganisms uses the electricity to convert the CO2 into hydrogen. That hydrogen is then consumed by another community of microorganisms living in the same system. These new microorganisms convert the hydrogen into acetate, which in turn feed yet another community of microorganisms. This last community of microorganisms uses the acetate to produce a liquid biofuel called butanol. Similar interdependent microbial communities can be found in some natural environments, but they’ve never been coupled together in an engineered cell to produce liquid fuels. MUSC is working to triple the amount of butanol that can be produced in its system and to reduce the overall cost of the process.

Electrofuels Project: UCLA is utilizing renewable electricity to power direct liquid fuel production in genetically engineered Ralstonia eutropha bacteria. UCLA is using renewable electricity to convert carbon dioxide into formic acid, a liquid soluble compound that delivers both carbon and energy to the bacteria. The bacteria are genetically engineered to convert the formic acid into liquid fuel—in this case alcohols such as butanol. The electricity required for the process can be generated from sunlight, wind, or other renewable energy sources. In fact, UCLA’s electricity-to-fuel system could be a more efficient way to utilize these renewable energy sources considering the energy density of liquid fuel is much higher than the energy density of other renewable energy storage options, such as batteries.

Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy project sheet summarizing general information about the Batteries for Electrical Energy Storage in Transportation (BEEST) program including critical needs, innovation and advantages, impacts, and contact information. This sheet discusses a new lithium-air battery for electric vehicles as part of the "High Performance Cathodes for Lithium-Air Batteries" project.

BEEST Project: Sion Power is developing a lithium-sulfur (Li-S) battery, a potentially cost-effective alternative to the Li-Ion battery that could store 400% more energy per pound. All batteries have 3 key parts—a positive and negative electrode and an electrolyte—that exchange ions to store and release electricity. Using different materials for these components changes a battery’s chemistry and its ability to power a vehicle. Traditional Li-S batteries experience adverse reactions between the electrolyte and lithium-based negative electrode that ultimately limit the battery to less than 50 charge cycles. Sion Power will sandwich the lithium- and sulfur-based electrode films around a separator that protects the negative electrode and increases the number of charges the battery can complete in its lifetime. The design could eventually allow for a battery with 400% greater storage capacity per pound than Li-Ion batteries and the ability to complete more than 500 recharge cycles.

This issue has the following articles: (1) Optimizing Electron-Positron Pair Production on kJ-Class High-Intensity Lasers for the Purpose of Pair-Plasma Creation; (2) Neutron Yield Study of Direct-Drive, Low-Adiabat Cryogenic D2 Implosions on OMEGA; (3) Al 1s-2p Absorption Spectroscopy of Shock-Wave Heating and Compression in Laser-Driven Planar Foil; (4) A Measurable Lawson Criterion and Hydro-Equivalent Curves for Inertial Confinement Fusion; (5) Pulsed-THz Characterization of Hg-Based, High-Temperature Superconductors; (6) LLE's Summer High School Research Program; (7) FY08 Laser Facility Report; and (8) National Laser Users Facility and External Users Programs.

Broad Funding Opportunity Announcement Project: In a battery, metal ions move between the electrodes through the electrolyte in order to store energy. Envia Systems is developing new silicon-based negative electrode materials for Li-Ion batteries. Using this technology, Envia will be able to produce commercial EV batteries that outperform today’s technology by 2-3 times. Many other programs have attempted to make anode materials based on silicon, but have not been able to produce materials that can withstand charge/discharge cycles multiple times. Envia has been able to make this material which can successfully cycle hundreds of times, on a scale that is economically viable. Today, Envia’s batteries exhibit world-record energy densities.

Broad Funding Opportunity Announcement Project: ITN is addressing the high cost of electrochromic windows with a new manufacturing process: roll-to-roll deposition of the film onto flexible plastic surfaces. Production of electrochromic films on plastic requires low processing temperatures and uniform film quality over large surface areas. ITN is overcoming these challenges using its previous experience in growing flexible thin-film solar cells and batteries. By developing sensor-based controls, ITN’s roll-to-roll manufacturing process yields more film over a larger area than traditional film deposition methods. Evaluating deposition processes from a control standpoint ultimately strengthens the ability for ITN to handle unanticipated deviations quickly and efficiently, enabling more consistent large-volume production. The team is currently moving from small-scale prototypes into pilot-scale production to validate roll-to-roll manufacturability and produce scaled prototypes that can be proven in simulated operating conditions. Electrochromic plastic films could also open new markets in building retrofit applications, vastly expanding the potential energy savings.

GRIDS Project: ABB is developing an advanced energy storage system using superconducting magnets that could store significantly more energy than today’s best magnetic storage technologies at a fraction of the cost. This system could provide enough storage capacity to encourage more widespread use of renewable power like wind and solar. Superconducting magnetic energy storage systems have been in development for almost 3 decades; however, past devices were designed to supply power only for short durations—generally less than a few minutes. ABB’s system would deliver the stored energy at very low cost, making it ideal for eventual use in the electricity grid as a costeffective competitor to batteries and other energy storage technologies. The device could potentially cost even less, on a per kilowatt basis, than traditional lead-acid batteries.

This report documents the preparation of materials for the marketing campaign that has been designed for middle and high school students in New Mexico to increase interest in participation in national security careers at the National Nuclear Security Administration. The materials and the marketing campaign build on the research that was previously completed, as well as the focus groups that were conducted. This work is a part of the National Nuclear Security Preparedness Project (NSPP). Previous research included outcome analysis to determine appropriate marketing strategies. The analysis was based upon focus groups with middle school and high school students, student interactions, and surveys completed by students to understand and gauge student interest in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) subjects, interest in careers at NNSA, future job considerations, and student desire to pursue post-secondary education. Further, through the focus groups, students were asked to attend a presentation on NNSA job opportunities and employee requirements. The feedback received from the students was utilized to develop the focus and components of a marketing campaign divided into DISCO (Discovering Intelligence and Security Career Opportunities) for the middle school age group and DISCO…..Your Way! for high school age groups. Both campaigns have an intertwined …