This report focuses on the creation of the Transatlantic Economic Council; the role of legislatures in the regulatory process; and the Transatlantic Legislators' Dialogue and its new role as an advisor to transatlantic regulatory efforts.

Managing policy differences on a range of issues emanating from the Middle East poses serious challenges for the United States and its European allies and friends. The most vitriolic dispute has centered on the conflict in Iraq. However, divisions over how best to approach the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict, manage Iran and Syria, and combat terrorism also persist. How deep and lasting the clash over Iraq and subsequent Middle East policies will be to transatlantic relations will likely depend on several factors, including whether Washington and European capitals can cooperate more robustly to rebuild Iraq; whether Europeans perceive a renewed U.S. commitment to revive the Middle East peace process; and whether differences over Mideast issues spill over into NATO or impede EU efforts to forge a deeper Union.

A U.S. consensus-based collaborative formed in 1994, the National Wind Coordinating Committee (NWCC) identifies issues that affect the use of wind power, establishes dialogue among key stakeholders, and catalyzes appropriate activities to support the development of environmentally, economically, and politically sustainable commercial markets for wind power. NWCC members include representatives from electric utilities and support organizations, state legislatures, state utility commissions, consumer advocacy offices, wind equipment suppliers and developers, green power marketers, environmental organizations, agriculture and economic development organizations, and state and federal agencies.

This report discusses the Invisible Hand Theorem, which states that when certain assumptions hold, market outcomes will be efficient.

Self-organized one- and two-dimensional arrays of nanoscale surface features ("ripples" and "dots") sometimes form spontaneously on initially flat surfaces eroded by a directed ion beam in a process called "sputter patterning". Experiments on this sputter patterning process with focused and unfocused ion beams, combined with theoretical advances, have been responsible for a number of scientific advances. Particularly noteworthy are (i) the discovery of propagative, rather than dissipative, behavior under some ion erosion conditions, permitting a pattern to be fabricated at a large length scale and propagated over large distances while maintaining, or even sharpening, the sharpest features; (ii) the first demonstration of guided self-organization of sputter patterns, along with the observation that defect density is minimized when the spacing between boundaries is near an integer times the natural spatial period; and (iii) the discovery of metastability of smooth surfaces, which contradicts the nearly universally accepted linear stability theory that predicts that any surface is linearly unstable to sinusoidal perturbations of some wave vector.

This report outlines legal issues around permit drilling for oil and gas in the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), Alaska as background for congressional legislation. Updated March 9, 2004.

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This report provides current statistical information, profiles the Afghanistan narcotics trade's participants, explores linkages between narcotics, insecurity, and corruption, and reviews U.S. and international policy responses since late 2001. The report also considers ongoing policy debates regarding the counternarcotics role of coalition military forces, poppy eradication, alternative livelihoods, and funding issues for Congress.

This report contains the issues for Congress regarding the United Nations (UN) human rights council.

The present research program is centered on the experimental and numerical study of two instabilities that develop at the interface between two different fluids when the interface experiences an impulsive or a constant acceleration. The instabilities, called the Richtmyer-Meshkov and Rayleigh-Taylor instability, respectively (RMI and RTI), adversely affect target implosion in experiments aimed at the achievement of nuclear fusion by inertial confinement by causing the nuclear fuel contained in a target and the ablated shell material to mix, leading to contamination of the fuel, yield reduction or no ignition at all. Specifically, our work is articulated in three main directions: study of impulsively accelerated spherical gas inhomogeneities; study of impulsively accelerated 2-D interfaces; study of a liquid interface under the action of gravity. The objectives common to all three activities are to learn some physics directly from our experiments and calculations; and to develop a database at previously untested conditions to be used to calibrate and verify some of the computational tools being developed within the RTI/RMI community at the national laboratories and the ASCI centers.

This report discusses US military operations in Iraq. Iraq's chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons programs, together with Iraqi long-range missile development and support for al-Queda terrorism, were the primary justifications put forward for military action.

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The purpose of this project was to manage the Western Resources Project, which included a comprehensive, basin-wide set of experiments investigating the impacts of coal bed methane (CBM; a.k.a. coal bed natural gas, CBNG) production on surface and groundwater in the Powder River Basin in Wyoming. This project included a number of participants including Apache Corporation, Conoco Phillips, Marathon, the Ucross Foundation, Stanford University, the University of Wyoming, Montana Bureau of Mines and Geology, and Western Research Institute.

A Multrireference Density Functional Approach to The Calculation of The Excited States of Uranium Ions

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory's (NREL's) National Wind Technology Center (NWTC), directed by the Department of Energy (DOE) is pursuing several research projects in variable speed. In the near future the laboratory will be reevaluating its ongoing experiments and plans. The starting point for this reevaluation will be a sound understanding of the current state of the art in design and application of variable-speed technology. This report, which outlines current technologies and historical applications of variable-speed, will provide a baseline in deciding the course of research in the upcoming years.

The focus of this research is to understand syringyl monolignol biosynthesis that leads to the formation of syringyl lignin, a type of lignin that can be easily removed during biomass conversion. We have achieved the three originally proposed goals for this project. (1) SAD and CAD genes (enzyme catalytic and kinetic properties) and their functional relevance to CAld5H/AldOMT pathway, (2) spatiotemporal expression patterns of Cald5H, AldOMT, SAD and CAD genes, and (3) functions of CAld5H, AldOMT, and SAD genes in vivo using transgenic aspen. Furthermore, we also found that microRNA might be involved in the upstream regulatory network of lignin biosynthesis and wood formation. The achievements are as below. (1) Based on biochemical and molecular studies, we discovered a novel syringyl-specific alcohol dehydrogenase (SAD) involved in monolignol biosynthesis in angiosperm trees. Through CAld5H/OMT/SAD mediation, syringyl monolignol biosynthesis branches out from guaiacyl pathway at coniferaldehyde; (2) The function of CAld5H gene in this syringyl monolignol biosynthesis pathway also was confirmed in vivo in transgenic Populus; (3) The proposed major monolignol biosynthesis pathways were further supported by the involving biochemical functions of CCR based on a detailed kinetic study; (4) Gene promoter activity analysis also supported the cell-type specific expression of SAD …

This report considers the constitutionality of federal tort reform legislation, such as the products liability and medical malpractice reform proposals that have been introduced for the last several Congresses.

This report considers the constitutionality of federal tort reform legislation, such as the products liability and medical malpractice reform proposals that have been introduced for the last several Congresses.

This report discusses the AIDS issues in Africa and the Bush administration call to double U.S. international funding for AIDS.

This report consists of allocation of wastewater treatment assistance: Formula and Other Changes.

The scale-up performance of sintered stainless steel crossflow filter elements planned for use at the Pretreatment Engineering Platform (PEP) and at the Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant (WTP) were characterized in partial fulfillment (see Table S.1) of the requirements of Test Plan TP RPP WTP 509. This test report details the results of experimental activities related only to filter scale-up characterization. These tests were performed under the Simulant Testing Program supporting Phase 1 of the demonstration of the pretreatment leaching processes at PEP. Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) conducted the tests discussed herein for Bechtel National, Inc. (BNI) to address the data needs of Test Specification 24590-WTP-TSP-RT-07-004. Scale-up characterization tests employ high-level waste (HLW) simulants developed under the Test Plan TP-RPP-WTP-469. The experimental activities outlined in TP-RPP-WTP-509 examined specific processes from two broad areas of simulant behavior: 1) leaching performance of the boehmite simulant as a function of suspending phase chemistry and 2) filtration performance of the blended simulant with respect to filter scale-up and fouling. With regard to leaching behavior, the effect of anions on the kinetics of boehmite leaching was examined. Two experiments were conducted: 1) one examined the effect of the aluminate anion on the rate of …

Our original proposal was presented to the LDRD committee on February 18, 1999. The revised proposal that followed incorporated changes that addressed the issues, concerns, and suggestions put forth by the committee members both during the presentation and in subsequent discussions we've had with individual committee members. The goal of the proposal was to establish an SMD confocal microscopy capability and technology base at LLNL. Here we report on our progress during the 6-month period for which funding was available.

In{sub x}Ga{sub 1-x}As{sub y}Sb{sub 1-y} thermophotovoltaic (TPV) diodes were grown lattice-matched to GaSb substrates by Metal Organic Vapor Phase Epitaxy (MOVPE) in the bandgap range of E{sub G} = 0.5 to 0.6eV. InGaAsSb TPV diodes, utilizing front-surface spectral control filters, are measured with thermal-to-electric conversion efficiency and power density of {eta}{sub TPV} = 19.7% and PD =0.58 W/cm{sup 2} respectively for a radiator temperature of T{sub radiator} = 950 C, diode temperature of T{sub diode} = 27 C, and diode bandgap of E{sub G} = 0.53eV. Practical limits to TPV energy conversion efficiency are established using measured recombination coefficients and optical properties of front surface spectral control filters, which for 0.53eV InGaAsSb TPV energy conversion is {eta}{sub TPV} = 28% and PD = 0.85W/cm{sup 2} at the above operating temperatures. The most severe performance limits are imposed by (1) diode open-circuit voltage (VOC) limits due to intrinsic Auger recombination and (2) parasitic photon absorption in the inactive regions of the module. Experimentally, the diode V{sub OC} is 15% below the practical limit imposed by intrinsic Auger recombination processes. Analysis of InGaAsSb diode electrical performance vs. diode architecture indicate that the V{sub OC} and thus efficiency is limited by extrinsic recombination …

Our understanding of the North American terrestrial carbon cycle is limited by both a lack of continental atmospheric CO2 data, and by a need for methods to interpret these and other continental data with confidence. In response to this challenge a rapid expansion of the N. American carbon cycle observational network is underway. This expansion includes a network of continuous, continental CO2 mixing ratio observations being collected at a subset of AmeriFlux towers. Progress in developing this resource includes instrument development, site installation, calibration and intercalibration efforts, and initiation of a uniform data product. Progess in applying these data include proposed methods for interpreting surface layer measurements in atmospheric inversions (the virtual tall towers approach), examination of coherence patterns in continental mixing ratios in response to weather and climate, and application of these mixing ratio measurements in formal atmospheric inversions. Future work will merge these methods with interpretation of flux towers observations of terrestrial carbon fluxes in an effort to create a single coherent diagnosis of North American terrestrial carbon fluxes over a multi-year period.