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Defense Infrastructure: Environmental Cleanup of Former Naval Facilities on Vieques (open access)

Defense Infrastructure: Environmental Cleanup of Former Naval Facilities on Vieques

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "This report responds to Congress's request that GAO determine the status and estimated costs of environmental cleanup on the island of Vieques. For decades, the U.S. Navy conducted ship-to-shore bombing exercises and other live-fire training activities on the island, which is located off the coast of Puerto Rico. The Navy ceased its operations on Vieques in 2003. The Navy has transferred the land to the Municipality of Vieques and the Puerto Rico Conservation Trust for conservation purposes and to the Department of the Interior. Although the land has been transferred, the Navy remains responsible for environmental cleanup. The cleanup is being carried out under the Defense Environmental Restoration Program (DERP) that consists of (1) the Installation Restoration Program, which addresses cleanup of hazardous substances, and (2) the Military Munitions Response Program, which addresses cleanup of munitions."
Date: March 26, 2007
Creator: United States. Government Accountability Office.
Object Type: Text
System: The UNT Digital Library
Nursing Homes: Efforts to Strengthen Federal Enforcement Have Not Deterred Some Homes from Repeatedly Harming Residents (open access)

Nursing Homes: Efforts to Strengthen Federal Enforcement Have Not Deterred Some Homes from Repeatedly Harming Residents

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "In 1998 and 1999 reports, GAO concluded that enforcement actions, known as sanctions, were ineffective in encouraging nursing homes to maintain compliance with federal quality requirements: sanctions were often rescinded before being implemented because homes had a grace period to correct deficiencies. In response, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) began requiring immediate sanctions for homes that repeatedly harmed residents. Using CMS enforcement and deficiency data, GAO (1) analyzed federal sanctions from fiscal years 2000 through 2005 against 63 homes previously reviewed and (2) assessed CMS's overall management of enforcement. The 63 homes had a history of harming residents and were located in 4 states that account for about 22 percent of homes nationwide."
Date: March 26, 2007
Creator: United States. Government Accountability Office.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Antidumping and Countervailing Duties: Congress and Agencies Should Take Additional Steps to Reduce Substantial Shortfalls in Duty Collection (open access)

Antidumping and Countervailing Duties: Congress and Agencies Should Take Additional Steps to Reduce Substantial Shortfalls in Duty Collection

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has been unable to collect hundreds of millions of dollars in antidumping (AD) and countervailing (CV) duties. The Department of Commerce imposes these duties to remedy injurious unfair foreign trade practices (unfairly low prices or subsidies). The noncollection of AD/CV duties means that the U.S. government has not fully remedied the unfair trade practices and bears a substantial loss of revenue. GAO was asked to examine the (1) nature and extent of uncollected AD/CV duties, (2) factors contributing to uncollected AD/CV duties and steps taken to address these factors, and (3) options for aiding duty collections. To analyze these issues, GAO reviewed CBP data for fiscal years 2001 through 2007, agency documents and reports, and interviewed government officials and private sector representatives"
Date: March 26, 2008
Creator: United States. Government Accountability Office.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Defense Services Acquisition: Questions for the Record (open access)

Defense Services Acquisition: Questions for the Record

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "On January 17, 2007, GAO testified before Congress on the Department of Defense's (DOD) management of its acquisition of services. GAO made several key points during the hearing. First, DOD's long-standing problems with contract management have become more prominent as DOD's reliance on contractors to provide services continues to grow. Second, DOD lacks sound contracting practices when acquiring services. Third, DOD's acquisition workforce has been downsized without sufficient attention to requisite skills and competencies. Fourth, DOD's acquisitions have resulted in outcomes that have cost the department valuable resources. And, finally, while DOD is taking some steps to address these problems, it does not know how well its services acquisition processes are working, which part of its mission can best be met through buying services, and whether it is obtaining the services it needs while protecting DOD's and the taxpayer's interests. Within this context, members of Congress requested that GAO provide additional comments on DOD's efforts regarding the following topics: interagency contracting, acquisition of services, acquisition reform, and the acquisition workforce."
Date: March 26, 2007
Creator: United States. Government Accountability Office.
Object Type: Text
System: The UNT Digital Library
Medicaid Long-Term Care: Few Transferred Assets before Applying for Nursing Home Coverage; Impact of Deficit Reduction Act on Eligibility Is Uncertain (open access)

Medicaid Long-Term Care: Few Transferred Assets before Applying for Nursing Home Coverage; Impact of Deficit Reduction Act on Eligibility Is Uncertain

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Medicaid program paid for nearly one-half of the nation's total long-term care expenditures in 2004. To be eligible for Medicaid long-term care, individuals may transfer assets (income and resources) to others to ensure that their assets fall below certain limits. Individuals who make transfers for less than fair market value (FMV) can be subject to a penalty that may delay Medicaid coverage. The Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 (DRA) changed the calculation and timing of the penalty period and set requirements for the treatment of certain types of assets. GAO was asked to provide data on the extent to which asset transfers for less than FMV occur. GAO examined (1) the financial characteristics of elderly nursing home residents nationwide, (2) the demographic and financial characteristics of a sample of Medicaid nursing home applicants, (3) the extent to which these applicants transferred assets for less than FMV, and (4) the potential effects of the DRA provisions related to Medicaid eligibility for long-term care. GAO analyzed data from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS), a national panel survey, and from 540 randomly selected Medicaid nursing home application …
Date: March 26, 2007
Creator: United States. Government Accountability Office.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Private Pensions: Multiemployer Plans Face Short- and Long-Term Challenges (open access)

Private Pensions: Multiemployer Plans Face Short- and Long-Term Challenges

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Multiemployer-defined benefit pension plans, which are created by collective bargaining agreements covering more than one employer and generally operated under the joint trusteeship of labor and management, provide coverage to over 9.7 million of the 44 million participants insured by the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC). The recent termination of several large single-employer plans--plans sponsored by individual firms--has led to millions of dollars in benefit losses for thousands of workers and left PBGC, their public insurer, an $11.2 billion deficit as of September 30, 2003. The serious difficulties experienced by these single-employer plans have prompted questions about the health of multiemployer plans. This report provides the following information on multiemployer pension plans: (1) trends in funding and worker participation, (2) PBGC's role regarding the plans' financial solvency, and (3) potential challenges to the plans' long-term prospects."
Date: March 26, 2004
Creator: United States. General Accounting Office.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Defense Contracting: Army Case Study Delineates Concerns with Use of Contractors as Contract Specialists (open access)

Defense Contracting: Army Case Study Delineates Concerns with Use of Contractors as Contract Specialists

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "In 2007, the Department of Defense (DOD) paid contractors $158.3 billion for a range of services, including contract specialists. To better understand the use of contractors in this role, GAO initiated a case study, under the authority of the Comptroller General, at the Army Contracting Agency's (ACA) Contracting Center of Excellence (CCE). GAO determined (1) the extent to which and why CCE relies on contractor contract specialists, (2) how risks of contractor use are mitigated, (3) how the cost of the contractors compares to that for CCE's government employees, and (4) whether the contract vehicles were appropriate. GAO reviewed a random sample of contract files to understand the contractors' duties and responsibilities, compared compensation costs, and reviewed documents from the General Services Administration (GSA), under whose contracts CCE ordered the contract specialists."
Date: March 26, 2008
Creator: United States. Government Accountability Office.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Methadone-Associated Overdose Deaths: Factors Contributing to Increased Deaths and Efforts to Prevent Them (open access)

Methadone-Associated Overdose Deaths: Factors Contributing to Increased Deaths and Efforts to Prevent Them

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Prescription drug abuse is a growing public health problem. In particular, methadone-associated overdose deaths--those in which methadone may have caused or contributed to the death--have risen sharply. Before the late 1990s, methadone was used mainly to treat opioid addiction but has since been increasingly prescribed to manage pain. Taken too often, in too high a dose, or with other drugs or alcohol, methadone can cause serious side effects and death. Methadone-associated overdose deaths can occur under several different scenarios, including improper dosing levels by practitioners, misuse by patients who may combine methadone with other drugs, or abuse--using the drug for nontherapeutic purposes. This report examines the regulation of methadone, factors that have contributed to the increase in methadone-associated overdose deaths, and steps taken to prevent methadone-associated overdose deaths. GAO reviewed documents, laws and regulations, data, and research from relevant state and federal agencies, including the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). GAO also interviewed federal officials, officials in five selected states, officials from professional associations and advocacy groups, and experts in pain management, addiction treatment, and forensic sciences."
Date: March 26, 2009
Creator: United States. Government Accountability Office.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Electronic Disability Claims Processing: SSA Needs to Address Risks Associated with Its Accelerated Systems Development Strategy (open access)

Electronic Disability Claims Processing: SSA Needs to Address Risks Associated with Its Accelerated Systems Development Strategy

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Social Security Administration's (SSA) AeDib initiative is designed to provide SSA with a more efficient, paperless system that will enable its disability components to electronically view and share claims data and process claims electronically. Yet previous GAO reviews found that SSA's accelerated strategy to develop AeDib involved risks that could threaten a complete and successful transition to this capability. At the Subcommittee's request, GAO reviewed AeDib to assess (1) SSA's progress and strategy, (2) the adequacy of measures taken to avoid software development problems similar to those encountered in SSA's previous efforts, (3) the adequacy of cost/benefit analyses, and (4) SSA's consultation with stakeholders."
Date: March 26, 2004
Creator: United States. General Accounting Office.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Management Reform: Continuing Progress in Implementing Initiatives in the President's Management Agenda (open access)

Management Reform: Continuing Progress in Implementing Initiatives in the President's Management Agenda

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "As part of its work to improve the management and the performance of the federal government, GAO monitors progress and continuing challenges related to the five crosscutting initiatives in the President's Management Agenda (PMA). The President cited GAO's high-risk areas and major management challenges in developing these initiatives. GAO remains committed to working with the Congress and the Administration to help address these complex issues."
Date: March 26, 2003
Creator: United States. General Accounting Office.
Object Type: Text
System: The UNT Digital Library
Defense Management: Key Challenges Should be Addressed When Considering Changes to Missile Defense Agency's Roles and Missions (open access)

Defense Management: Key Challenges Should be Addressed When Considering Changes to Missile Defense Agency's Roles and Missions

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "To more quickly field ballistic missile defenses, the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) has been exempted from traditional Department of Defense (DOD) requirements development, acquisition, and oversight processes since its creation in 2002. Instead, MDA has unique roles and missions to develop and field weapon systems that address a variety of ballistic missile threats. To date, MDA has spent about $56 billion and plans to spend about $50 billion more through 2013 to develop an integrated Ballistic Missile Defense System. The system consists of a layered network of capabilities that includes defensive components such as sensors, radars, interceptors, and command and control. In reviews of DOD's approach to acquire, operate, and maintain ballistic missile defense systems, GAO has previously reported on several challenges that have stemmed from the broad flexibilities provided to MDA. This testimony summarizes the challenges facing DOD in acquiring and operating its ballistic missile defense systems and describes DOD's efforts to improve transparency and accountability. This statement is based primarily on previously issued GAO reports and testimonies. GAO also reviewed documents and interviewed key officials to update past work and identify DOD and MDA efforts to …
Date: March 26, 2009
Creator: United States. Government Accountability Office.
Object Type: Text
System: The UNT Digital Library
Human Subjects Research: Undercover Tests Show the Institutional Review Board System Is Vulnerable to Unethical Manipulation (open access)

Human Subjects Research: Undercover Tests Show the Institutional Review Board System Is Vulnerable to Unethical Manipulation

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Millions of Americans enroll in clinical studies of experimental drugs and medical devices each year. Many of these studies are meant to demonstrate that products are safe and effective. The Department of Health and Human Services' (HHS) Office for Human Research Protections (OHRP) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) are responsible for overseeing aspects of a system of independent institutional review boards (IRB). IRBs review and monitor human subjects research, with the intended purpose of protecting the rights and welfare of the research subjects. GAO investigated three key aspects of the IRB system: (1) the process for establishing an IRB, (2) the process through which researchers wishing to apply for federal funding assure HHS their human subjects research activities follow ethical principles and federal regulations, and (3) the process that medical research companies follow to get approval for conducting research on human subjects. GAO investigated these three aspects of the IRB system by creating two fictitious companies (one IRB and one medical device company), phony company officials, counterfeit documents, and a fictitious medical device."
Date: March 26, 2009
Creator: United States. Government Accountability Office.
Object Type: Text
System: The UNT Digital Library
Child Support Enforcement: Clear Guidance Would Help Ensure Proper Access To Information and Use of Wage Withholding by Private Firms (open access)

Child Support Enforcement: Clear Guidance Would Help Ensure Proper Access To Information and Use of Wage Withholding by Private Firms

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "To increase child support collections, Congress has considered proposals to improve the ability of private firms to gather information to help locate noncustodial parents and enforce the payment of child support. At the end of fiscal year 2000, the Office of Child Support Enforcement (OCSE) indicated that $89 billion in child support was owed but unpaid--a 96-percent increase since the end of fiscal year 1996. GAO believes that this amount is understated. Thousands of private and public sector entities can collect child support. Both private firms and state agencies reported collections from about 60 percent of their cases. Twenty-two of the 24 private firms GAO reviewed reported that they relied on private information vendors--commercial firms that sell information such as addresses, telephone numbers, and social security numbers--as their primary information source, whereas about one-third of state agencies reported using this source. State agencies relied heavily on state and federal automated databases to locate noncustodial parents and their assets. Additionally, private firms and the state agencies reported calling noncustodial parents to collect child support. However, only the private firms called third parties, such as relatives and neighbors …
Date: March 26, 2002
Creator: United States. General Accounting Office.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Pesticides on Tobacco: Federal Activities to Assess Risks and Monitor Residues (open access)

Pesticides on Tobacco: Federal Activities to Assess Risks and Monitor Residues

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pesticides play a significant role in increasing production of tobacco, food, and other crops by reducing the number of crop-destroying pests. However, if used improperly, pesticides can have significant adverse health effects. GAO was asked to (1) identify the pesticides commonly used on tobacco crops and the potential health risks associated with them, (2) determine how the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) assesses and mitigates health risks associated with pesticides used on tobacco, and (3) assess the extent to which federal agencies regulate and test for pesticide residues on tobacco."
Date: March 26, 2003
Creator: United States. General Accounting Office.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
South Florida Ecosystem Restoration: Improved Science Coordination Needed to Increase the Likelihood of Success (open access)

South Florida Ecosystem Restoration: Improved Science Coordination Needed to Increase the Likelihood of Success

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Restoration of the South Florida ecosystem is a complex, long-term federal and state undertaking that requires the development of extensive scientific information. GAO was asked to report on the funds spent on scientific activities for restoration, the gaps that exist in scientific information, and the extent to which scientific activities are being coordinated."
Date: March 26, 2003
Creator: United States. General Accounting Office.
Object Type: Text
System: The UNT Digital Library
Medicare Savings Programs: Results of Social Security Administration's 2002 Outreach to Low-Income Beneficiaries (open access)

Medicare Savings Programs: Results of Social Security Administration's 2002 Outreach to Low-Income Beneficiaries

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "To assist low-income beneficiaries with their share of premiums and other out-of-pocket costs associated with Medicare, Congress has created four Medicare savings programs. Historic low enrollment in these programs has been attributed to several factors, including lack of awareness about the programs, and cumbersome eligibility determination and enrollment processes through state Medicaid programs. Concerned about this low enrollment, Congress passed legislation as part of the Medicare, Medicaid, and SCHIP Benefits Improvement and Protection Act of 2000 (BIPA) requiring the Social Security Administration (SSA) to notify low-income Medicare beneficiaries of their potential eligibility for Medicare savings programs. The statute also required GAO to study the impact of SSA's outreach effort. GAO examined what outreach SSA undertook to increase enrollment, how enrollment changed following SSA's 2002 outreach, and how enrollment changed in selected states following SSA's outreach and what additional outreach efforts these states undertook. GAO reviewed information obtained from SSA and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), analyzed enrollment data provided by SSA and CMS, and interviewed officials in and obtained data from six selected states (Alabama, California, Louisiana, New York, Pennsylvania, and Washington)."
Date: March 26, 2004
Creator: United States. General Accounting Office.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Book Review Geostatistical Analysis of Compositional Data (open access)

Book Review Geostatistical Analysis of Compositional Data

Compositional data are represented as vector variables with individual vector components ranging between zero and a positive maximum value representing a constant sum constraint, usually unity (or 100 percent). The earth sciences are flooded with spatial distributions of compositional data, such as concentrations of major ion constituents in natural waters (e.g. mole, mass, or volume fractions), mineral percentages, ore grades, or proportions of mutually exclusive categories (e.g. a water-oil-rock system). While geostatistical techniques have become popular in earth science applications since the 1970s, very little attention has been paid to the unique mathematical properties of geostatistical formulations involving compositional variables. The book 'Geostatistical Analysis of Compositional Data' by Vera Pawlowsky-Glahn and Ricardo Olea (Oxford University Press, 2004), unlike any previous book on geostatistics, directly confronts the mathematical difficulties inherent to applying geostatistics to compositional variables. The book righteously justifies itself with prodigious referencing to previous work addressing nonsensical ranges of estimated values and error, spurious correlation, and singular cross-covariance matrices.
Date: March 26, 2007
Creator: Carle, S F
Object Type: Article
System: The UNT Digital Library
Colliding with a crunching bubble (open access)

Colliding with a crunching bubble

In the context of eternal inflation we discuss the fate of Lambda = 0 bubbles when they collide with Lambda< 0 crunching bubbles. When the Lambda = 0 bubble is supersymmetric, it is not completely destroyed by collisions. If the domain wall separating the bubbles has higher tension than the BPS bound, it is expelled from the Lambda = 0 bubble and does not alter its long time behavior. If the domain wall saturates the BPS bound, then it stays inside the Lambda = 0 bubble and removes a finite fraction of future infinity. In this case, the crunch singularity is hidden behind the horizon of a stable hyperbolic black hole.
Date: March 26, 2007
Creator: Freivogel, Ben; Freivogel, Ben; Horowitz, Gary T. & Shenker, Stephen
Object Type: Article
System: The UNT Digital Library
Poland Becoming a Member of the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, Vol. 1. (open access)

Poland Becoming a Member of the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, Vol. 1.

Within a constrained carbon environment, the risks of future natural gas supply, and the need to move to market-based electricity prices, the study team found: (1) the deployment of new nuclear energy in Poland itself is very competitive in the next decade or two; (2) if such generation could be made available to Poland prior to deployment of its own nuclear generation facilities, Poland would benefit from partnering with its Baltic neighbors to import electricity derived from new nuclear generation facilities sited in Lithuania; and (3) Poland appears to be a good candidate for a partnership in the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) as an emerging nuclear energy country.
Date: March 26, 2007
Creator: Koritarov, V. K.; Conzelmann, G.; Cirillo, R. R. & Goldberg, S. M.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Determination of the Evaporation Coefficient of D2O (open access)

Determination of the Evaporation Coefficient of D2O

The evaporation rate of D{sub 2}O has been determined by Raman thermometry of a droplet train (12-15 {micro}m diameter) injected into vacuum ({approx}10{sup -5} torr). The cooling rate measured as a function of time in vacuum was fit to a model that accounts for temperature gradients between the surface and the core of the droplets, yielding an evaporation coefficient ({gamma}{sub e}) of 0.57 {+-} 0.06. This is nearly identical to that found for H{sub 2}O (0.62 {+-} 0.09) using the same experimental method and model, and indicates the existence of a kinetic barrier to evaporation. The application of a recently developed transition state theory (TST) model suggests that the kinetic barrier is due to librational and hindered translational motions at the liquid surface, and that the lack of an isotope effect is due to competing energetic and entropic factors. The implications of these results for cloud and aerosol particles in the atmosphere are discussed.
Date: March 26, 2008
Creator: Drisdell, Walter S.; Cappa, Christopher D.; Smith, Jared D.; Saykally, Richard J. & Cohen, Ronald C.
Object Type: Article
System: The UNT Digital Library
Poland Becoming a Member of the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, Vol. 2. (open access)

Poland Becoming a Member of the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, Vol. 2.

Within a constrained carbon environment, the risks of future natural gas supply, and the need to move to market-based electricity prices, the study team found: (1) the deployment of new nuclear energy in Poland itself is very competitive in the next decade or two; (2) if such generation could be made available to Poland prior to deployment of its own nuclear generation facilities, Poland would benefit from partnering with its Baltic neighbors to import electricity derived from new nuclear generation facilities sited in Lithuania; and (3) Poland appears to be a good candidate for a partnership in the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) as an emerging nuclear energy country.
Date: March 26, 2007
Creator: Koritarov, V. K.; Conzelmann, G.; Cirillo, R. R. & Goldberg, S. M.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Calibration of the HB line active well neutron coincidence counter for measurement of LANL 3013 highly enriched uranium product splits (open access)

Calibration of the HB line active well neutron coincidence counter for measurement of LANL 3013 highly enriched uranium product splits

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Date: March 26, 2008
Creator: Dewberry, R.; Williams, D. R.; Lee, R. S.; Roberts, D. W.; Arrigo, L. M. & Salaymeh, S. R.
Object Type: Article
System: The UNT Digital Library
Climate response to projected changes in short-lived species under an A1B scenario from 2000-2050 in the GISS climate model (open access)

Climate response to projected changes in short-lived species under an A1B scenario from 2000-2050 in the GISS climate model

We investigate the climate forcing from and response to projected changes in short-lived species and methane under the A1B scenario from 2000-2050 in the GISS climate model. We present a meta-analysis of new simulations of the full evolution of gas and aerosol species and other existing experiments with variations of the same model. The comparison highlights the importance of several physical processes in determining radiative forcing, especially the effect of climate change on stratosphere-troposphere exchange, heterogeneous sulfate-nitrate-dust chemistry, and changes in methane oxidation and natural emissions. However, the impact of these fairly uncertain physical effects is substantially less than the difference between alternative emission scenarios for all short-lived species. The net global mean annual average direct radiative forcing from the short-lived species is .02 W/m{sup 2} or less in our projections, as substantial positive ozone forcing is largely offset by negative aerosol direct forcing. Since aerosol reductions also lead to a reduced indirect effect, the global mean surface temperature warms by {approx}0.07 C by 2030 and {approx}0.13 C by 2050, adding 19% and 17%, respectively, to the warming induced by long-lived greenhouse gases. Regional direct forcings are large, up to 3.8 W/m{sup 2}. The ensemble-mean climate response shows little regional …
Date: March 26, 2007
Creator: Menon, Surabi; Shindell, Drew T.; Faluvegi, Greg; Bauer, Susanne E.; Koch, Dorothy M.; Unger, Nadine et al.
Object Type: Article
System: The UNT Digital Library
Failure Forewarning in NPP Equipment NERI2000-109 Final Project Report (open access)

Failure Forewarning in NPP Equipment NERI2000-109 Final Project Report

The objective of this project is forewarning of machine failures in critical equipment at next-generation nuclear power plants (NPP). Test data were provided by two collaborating institutions: Duke Engineering and Services (first project year), and the Pennsylvania State University (Applied Research Laboratory) during the second and third project years. New nonlinear methods were developed and applied successfully to extract forewarning trends from process-indicative, time-serial data for timely, condition-based maintenance. Anticipation of failures in critical equipment at next-generation NPP will improve the scheduling of maintenance activities to minimize safety concerns, unscheduled non-productive downtime, and collateral damage due to unexpected failures. This approach provides significant economic benefit, and is expected to improve public acceptance of nuclear power. The approach is a multi-tiered, model-independent, and data-driven analysis that uses ORNL's novel nonlinear method to extract forewarning of machine failures from appropriate data. The first tier of the analysis provides a robust choice for the process-indicative data. The second tier rejects data of inadequate quality. The third tier removes signal artifacts that would otherwise confound the analysis, while retaining the relevant nonlinear dynamics. The fourth tier converts the artifact-filtered time-serial data into a geometric representation, that is then transformed to a discrete distribution function …
Date: March 26, 2004
Creator: Hively, LM
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library