The practical effects of blistering and flaking in neutral injection systems are studied. These effects will soon be more important because of energy increases in systems now under development and because of their operation with fast helium ions as well as hydrogen and deuterium ions. Two main effects were studied: enhanced erosion rate and possible voltage breakdown from sharp flakes and gas emission.

The Lawrence Livermore Laboratory seismic net was upgraded by installing two horizontal seismometers at each of the four LLL stations. These seismometers record radial and transverse ground motion from underground nuclear explosions at the Nevada Test Site and complement the vertical components which were installed several years ago. Each station now monitors three orthogonal components of ground velocity over a broad frequency band.

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, John L. Hill, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Applicability of Texas Education Agency regulations to grievance proceedings before boards of public community college districts.

A weekly publication, the Texas Register serves as the journal of state agency rulemaking for Texas. Information published in the Texas Register includes proposed, adopted, withdrawn and emergency rule actions, notices of state agency review of agency rules, governor's appointments, attorney general opinions, and miscellaneous documents such as requests for proposals. After adoption, these rulemaking actions are codified into the Texas Administrative Code.

This report summarizes a collection of, synthesis of, and speculation on the geophysical and geochemical models of the earth's stable shields and rift zones. Two basic crustal types, continental and oceanic, and two basic mantle types, stable and unstable, are described. It is pointed out that both the crust and upper mantle play a strongly interactive role with surface geological phenomena ranging from the occurrence of mountains, ocean trenches, oceanic and continental rifts to geographic distributions of earthquakes, faults, and volcanoes. On the composition of the mantle, there is little doubt regarding the view that olivine constitutes a major fraction of the mineralogy of the earth's upper mantle. Studies are suggested to simulate the elasticity and composition of the earth's lower crust and upper mantle.

Information related to sodium fires and fission products in LMFBR type reactors is presented concerning SOMIX code development; sodium jet dispersal tests; aerosol leakage; high temperature-concentration aerosol tests; aerosol source term size; and properties of high temperature fuel mixtures.

This report presents some findings about representation of Mexican Americans in the executive branch of government in the United States.

Six major problem areas have surfaced in the past twenty-five years concerning the use of plutonium tankage. The most significant of these involves the use of borosilicate glass as a neutron absorber. Approximately thirty recommendations and criteria resulted from a study of these problem areas. Not all of the criteria and recommendations are unanimously supported by all members of the committee. The committee agrees that problem areas that can be handled on a short-term basis are being pursued expeditiously. Most of the criteria presented will apply to new tankage to be installed. The committee also noted fourteen accomplishments in the last 1/sup 1///sub 2/ years directed to the application of the criteria.

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, John L. Hill, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Transfer of funds by the Comptroller

A weekly publication, the Texas Register serves as the journal of state agency rulemaking for Texas. Information published in the Texas Register includes proposed, adopted, withdrawn and emergency rule actions, notices of state agency review of agency rules, governor's appointments, attorney general opinions, and miscellaneous documents such as requests for proposals. After adoption, these rulemaking actions are codified into the Texas Administrative Code.

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This report outlines the history and use of Executive Orders in the United States.

Participants from thirteen member nations of the International Energy Agency and the Commission of European Communities have been conducting cooperative energy systems analyses, the goal of which is to evaluate the possible impacts of new and conservation technologies. Such studies are intended to provide analytical bases to aid future decisions on cooperative research and development projects. In the initial studies, a quantitative description of the 1974 energy system has been prepared for each participating nation. The nations accounted for approximately half of the world energy consumption in 1974. They imported more than 30 percent of their primary energy requirements from other nations of the world. Oil and natural gas supplied almost /sup 3///sub 4/ of the energy. Reference projections were made for the years 1985 and 2000 to provide base cases for studies of the impacts of new and conservation technologies. Although these projections are not intended to be forecasts, taken together they indicate an increasing gap between the demand for energy and foreseeable domestic supplies, thus underscoring the urgency for the vigorous introduction of new energy technologies as well as the need for strong efforts in energy conservation. Some preliminary evaluations of selected technologies were made as a function …

Tests were performed to determine the effect cleanliness of a surface exposed to tritium gas had on methane formation. These tests performed on 304 stainless steel vessels, cleaned in various ways, showed that the methane formation was reduced by the use of various cleaning procedures.

Space charge as it affects ion beam transport is reviewed. The approach here will be to derive beam-current criteria for divergence from space charge, review recent theoretical models for fractional space-charge neutralization, discuss space-charge-related observations on ion-beam transport in a specific experimental system, and briefly note several applications using space charge. Experimental measurements of effective space charge are discussed for a dc ion-source test stand using a 90/sup 0/ double-focusing magnet for species separation and for a solenoidal lens magnet for trim focus of the ion beam preparatory to entrance into a 400-kV accelerator column.

This report describes the use of noise analysis to investigate in-core instrument tube vibrations in BWR-4 reactors. Neutron noise signals from in-core fission chambers and acoustic noise signals from externally mounted accelerometers were used in these studies. The results show that neutron noise can be used to detect vibration and, more importantly, impacting of instrument tubes against adjacent fuel channel boxes. Externally mounted accelerometers detect impacting but not rubbing of instrument tubes against fuel channel boxes. Accelerometers can monitor impacting only on the particular instrument tube where the accelerometer is mounted. Surveillance for instrument tube impacts can be accomplished using standard BWR-4 in-core power range neutron flux detectors at all instrument tube locations containing these detectors. Ex-vessel accelerometers can then be used to monitor instrument tubes that lack power range neutron flux detectors. However, noise on axial flux profiles obtained with movable in-core detectors is not a reliable indicator of impacting, because the recorder used to plot the flux profiles does not respond adequately to the noise frequency generated by impacting.

Letter opinion issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, John L. Hill, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Constitutionality of Senate Bill 140, which would provide textbooks to students in nonpublic schools.

A weekly publication, the Texas Register serves as the journal of state agency rulemaking for Texas. Information published in the Texas Register includes proposed, adopted, withdrawn and emergency rule actions, notices of state agency review of agency rules, governor's appointments, attorney general opinions, and miscellaneous documents such as requests for proposals. After adoption, these rulemaking actions are codified into the Texas Administrative Code.

The local environment surrounding Mound Laboratory was monitored for tritium and plutonium-238 released by Mound Laboratory. The results are reported for calendar year 1976. The environmental parameters analyzed included air, water, foodstuffs, and silt. The average concentrations of plutonium-238 and tritium were within the stringent standards for radioactive species adopted by the U.S. Energy Research and Development Administration. Data concerning nonradioactive species in air and water are also presented and compared to federal, state, and local standards, where applicable. Although there are no specific standards (RCG) for plutonium-238 and tritium in foodstuffs, the concentrations found, if compared to the water standard, are also a small fraction of the RCG. In addition, there is no evidence of other than minimal reentrainment of radioactive species from silt. Mound Laboratory has undertaken a comprehensive program to bring water supplies into compliance with new U.S. EPA drinking water standards which will be effective June 24, 1977. Mound Laboratory has been granted a National Pollutant Discharge Ellimination System permit. Analyses during 1976 indicate compliance with permit conditions. All results indicated that Mound effluent streams have no significant effect on the Great Miami River and certainly do not cause Ohio Stream Standards to be exceeded. These …

This is the Final Report under ERDA Contract. It presents the results of Phase I of a proposed three-phase effort.

The increasing demand for uranium as reactor fuel requires the addition of sizable new domestic reserves. One of the largest potential sources of low-grade uranium ore is the Chattanooga shale--a formation in Tennessee and neighboring states that has not been mined conventionally because it is expensive and environmentally disadvantageous to do so. An in situ process, on the other hand, might be used to extract uranium from this formation without the attendant problems of conventional mining. We have suggested developing such a process, in which fracturing, retorting, and pressure leaching might be used to extract the uranium. The potential advantages of such a process are that capital investment would be reduced, handling and disposing of the ore would be avoided, and leaching reagents would be self-generated from air and water. If successful, the cost reductions from these factors could make the uranium produced competitive with that from other sources, and substantially increase domestic reserves. A technical program to evaluate the processing problems has been outlined and a conceptual model of the extraction process has been developed. Preliminary cost estimates have been made, although it is recognized that their validity depends on how successfully the various processing steps are carried out. …

This report investigates the application of the Solar Total Energy System (STES) to the commercial sector (e.g., office buildings, shopping centers, retail stores, etc.) in the United States. Candidate solar thermal and solar photovoltaic concepts are considered for providing on-site electrical power generation as well as thermal energy for both heating and cooling applications. The solar thermal concepts include the use of solar concentrators (distributed or central receiver) for collection of the thermal energy for conversion to electricity by means of a Rankine cycle or Brayton cycle power conversion system. Recoverable waste heat from the power generation process is utilized to help meet the building thermal energy demand. Evaluation methodology is identified to allow ranking and/or selection of the most cost-effective concept for commercial building applications.

A series of 12 irradiation experiments was designed to evaluate the creep characteristics of graphites when exposed to elevated temperatures and high fast fluences. Various graphites of interest to HTGR designers are to be examined. The series encompasses the irradiation of 28 specimens, each 15.24 mm (0.6 in.) in diameter by 25.4 mm (1 in.) long, to incremental exposures of 1, 2, 4, and 8 E + 25 n/m/sup 2/ (E greater than 0.18 MeV) at 900/sup 0/C; 28 similar specimens to the same exposures at 600/sup 0/C; and 28 others at 1250/sup 0/C. A compressive stress of 13.79 MPa (2000 psi) is applied to 20 of the specimens in each test by means of a metal bellows, which is expanded by gas pressure against the specimen columns; 8 of the stacked specimens are stressed to 20.68 MPa (3000 psi) by a reduction in diameter. The report describes special features of the capsules, which include (1) movable centerline thermocouples to measure the temperature profile along the axes of the capsule, (2) special linear variable differential transformer-type load cells to monitor the applied load, and (3) a computerized temperature control system designed to provide accurate longitudinal temperatures over the 0.508-m (20-in.) …

The results of an experimental study on the trapping and energy loss mechanisms of intense, relativistic electron rings confined in Astron-like magnetic field geometries are presented. The work is subdivided into four sections: gas trapping; average ring electron energetics; plasma trapping, and hollow-beam cusp-injection into gas and plasma. The mechanisms by which the injected beam coalesces into a current ring in the existing Cornell RECE-Berta facility are considered. To investigate the nature of ring electron energy loss mechanisms following completion of the trapping process, a diagnostic was developed utilizing multi-foil X-ray absorption spectroscopy to analyze the Bremsstrahlung generated by the electrons as they impinge upon a thin tungsten wire target suspended in the circulating current. Finally, a set of preliminary experimental results is presented in which an annular electron beam was passed through a coaxial, non-adiabatic magnetic cusp located at one end of a magnetic mirror well.