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, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether an individual who was unassociated with a racetrack license at the time the racetrack licensee at the time the racetrack was licensed or was operating may request reinstatement of the racetrack license under section 6.19 of the Texas Racing Act, V.T.C.S. article 179e (ID# 18204)

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, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether a home-rule city may adopt a nepotism rule that is more restrictive than state law (RQ-359)

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, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether a legislator who serves as an independent contractor for an independent school district holds a “position of profit under this State” (RQ-513)

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, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification;Whether the Department of Public Safety is authorized to require the presentation of the original Social Security card when a person applies for a new or renewal driver's license(ID# 18190).

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, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification;Whether a state employee may serve on the board of directors of a municipal utility district (ID# 19055).

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, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification;Whether the Lubbock county hospital district may contribute funds for construction of an international cultural center at Texas Tech University(RQ-502).

Newsletter published by the Texas Department of Transportation for TxDOT employees including information about the organization, projects throughout the state, and other topics related to transportation in Texas.

The purpose of this report is to compare the cost of selected alternative processes for the conversion of lignocellulosic biomass to ethanol. In turn, this information will be used by the ARS/USDA to guide the management of research and development programs in biomass conversion. The report will identify where the cost leverages are for the selected alternatives and what performance parameters need to be achieved to improve the economics. The process alternatives considered here are not exhaustive, but are selected on the basis of having a reasonable potential in improving the economics of producing ethanol from biomass. When other alternatives come under consideration, they should be evaluated by the same methodology used in this report to give fair comparisons of opportunities. A generic plant design is developed for an annual production of 25 million gallons of anhydrous ethanol using corn stover as the model substrate at $30/dry ton. Standard chemical engineering techniques are used to give first order estimates of the capital and operating costs. Following the format of the corn to ethanol plant, there are nine sections to the plant; feed preparation, pretreatment, hydrolysis, fermentation, distillation and dehydration, stillage evaporation, storage and denaturation, utilities, and enzyme production. There are …

Simple mass transport models using constant boundary conditions at the waste form surface and at the host rock boundary do not always result in realistic predictions of the performance of an underground repository for the disposal of high-level radioactive waste. What is needed is a model that couples the important processes that can not be modeled independently, including (1) thermal modeling, (2) geochemical modeling, (3) containment degradation, (4) waste form dissolution, and (5) radionuclide transport. Such a model is being developed by modifying the AREST code.

The design and construction of facilities and structures for the processing and safe long-term storage of low- and high-level radioactive wastes will likely employ structural concrete. This concrete will be used for many purposes including structural support, shielding, and environmental protection. At the present time, there are no design costs, standards or guidelines for repositories, waste containers, or processing facilities. Recently, the design and construction guidelines contained in American Concrete Institute (ACI), Code Requirements for Nuclear Safety Related Concrete Structures (ACI 349), have been cited for low-level waste (LLW) repositories. Conceptual design of various high-level (HLW) repository surface structures have also cited the ACI 349 Code. However, the present Code was developed for nuclear power generating facilities and its application to radioactive waste repositories was not intended. For low and medium level radioactive wastes, concrete has a greater role and use in processing facilities, engineered barriers, and repository structures. Because of varied uses and performance/safety requirements this review of the current ACI 349 Code document was required to accommodate these special classes of structures.

A conceptual design study was prepared that: (1) reviewed the operations necessary to perform the mechanical disassembly of Fort St. Vrain fuel elements; (2) contained a description and survey of equipment capable of performing the necessary functions; and (3) performed a tradeoff study for determining the preferred concepts and equipment specifications. A preferred system was recommended and engineering specifications for this system were developed.

The United States Department of Energy (DOE) is investigating the suitability of Yucca Mountain as a potential site for the nation`s first high-level nuclear waste repository. The site is located about 120 km northwest of Las Vegas, Nevada, in an area of uninhabited desert (Fig. 1). Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) is a Yucca Mountain Site Characterization Project (YMP) participant and is responsible for the development of waste package (WP) and engineered barrier system (EBS) design concepts, including materials testing and selection, design criteria development, waste-form characterization, performance assessments, and near-field environment (NFE) characterization.

In order to study diffusion in any region of phase space containing nested closed curves we choose action-angle variables, {gamma}, J. the action J labels each closed phase curve and is equal to its area divided by 2{pi}. We can introduce rectangular variables Q,P by the equations Q=(2J){sup 1/2}sin{gamma}, P=(2J){sup 1/2}cos{gamma}, where the angle variable {gamma} is measured clockwise from the P-axis. The phase curves are circles in the Q,P plane with radius (2J){sup 1/2}. We assume that the motion consists of a Hamiltonian motion along a curve of fixed J (in the original coordinate system and in the system Q,P) plus a diffusion and a damping which can change the value of J. Now consider a system of particles described by a density {rho}(J,t), so that the number of particles between the curves J and J+dJ is dN={rho}(J,t)dJ. These cN particles are distributed uniformly in the phase space between the curves J and J+dJ.

The Nagra-DOE Cooperative (NDC-I) research program was sponsored by the US Department of Energy (DOE) through the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory (LBL), and the Swiss Nationale Genossenschaft fuer die Lagerung radioaktiver Abfaella (Nagra). Scientists participating in this project explored the geological, geophysical, hydrological, geochemical, and structural effects anticipated from the use of a rock mass as a geologic repository for nuclear waste. Six joint tasks were defined and are described briefly below. Tasks 1, 2, 3 and 5 were concerned with the characterization of fractured rock. Task 5 in particular was focused on investigations at the Grimsel Underground Laboratory in the Swiss Alps. Tasks 2 and 6 focused on the phenomenology associated with storing radioactive waste underground.

This report discusses the following concepts on quantum gravity: The affine gauge approach; affine gauge transformations versus active differomorphisms; affine gauge approach to quantum gravity with topology change.

We have measured emittances in a low-energy proton beam at energies between 19 and 45 KeV and currents between 9 and 39 mA. The rms emittance of the space-charge dominated proton beam, as measured by a moving-slit emittance probe, grew by an average amount of 60% in a propagation distance of 2.5 cm. An Abel inversion procedure was applied to the measured transverse charge distribution of the proton beam in order to calculate the electrostatic field energy, which is the driving quantity for emittance growth. We have found that all of the emittance growth is due to a halo containing {approx_equal} 10% of the beam particles.

Monitoring building energy performance can provide important immediate feedback to building personnel in building commissioning, operation and maintenance. It also provides an essential ``reality-check`` and feedback (immediate and longer-term) in many utility efforts such as demand-side management impact evaluation, forecasting, and conservation measure technology assessment. However, monitoring can be quite expensive, often resulting in either the need to reduce experimental sample sizes (with resulting reduced accuracy) or to forgo monitoring altogether. Analysis of data from in-place Energy Management and Control Systems (EMCSs) may be an effective alternative to dedicated monitoring in many cases. EMCS-based monitoring can have several advantages: reduced cost due to the fact that the equipment has already been purchased and installed, an increased amount of available data, information on building operation, and an on-site data processing capability. The use of EMCSs for monitoring has been investigated at several sites within two different conservation programs: the Energy Edge Evaluation Project (new construction), and the Texas LoanSTAR Monitoring and Analysis Program (retrofit). The text that follows provides an overview of the potential role that EMCS-based monitoring may play in conservation efforts, and a summary of the findings of these investigations. The presentation at the National Conference on Building Commissioning …

Platinum atoms near a (111) single-crystal face have been imaged using photoelectron holography. Electron angular intensity patterns were collected at equally spaced wavenumbers from 6 to 12{Angstrom}{sup {minus}1}. Images of atoms near expected atomic positions are obtained from single-wavenumber analyses over the range of the data set. Positions are detected further from the emitter than we have seen previously, and symmetry assumptions are not required. We have also adopted a three dimensional means of representing the data in order to help understand the results. Twin image suppression and artifact reduction in the holographically reconstructed data are set are obtained when images at different wavenumbers are correctly phase-summed. We are assessing the capability of the technique for rendering true three-dimensional structural information for unknown systems.

The correction of the chromaticity of low-beta insertions in the storage rings is usually made with sextupole lenses in the ring`s arcs. When decreasing the beta functions at the insertion point (IP), this technique becomes fairly ineffective, since it fails to properly correct the higher order chromatic aberrations. Here we consider the approach where the chromatic effects of the quadrupole lenses generating low beta functions at the IP are corrected locally with two families of sextupoles, one family for each plane. Each family has two pairs of sextupoles which are located symmetrically on both sides of the IP. The sextupole-like aberrations of individual sextupoles are eliminated by utilizing optics forming a -I transformation between sextupoles in the pair. The optics also includes bending magnets which preserve equal dispersion functions at the two sextupoles in each pair. At sextupoles in one family, the vertical beta function is made large and the horizontal is made small. The situation is reversed in the sextupoles of the other family. The betatron phase advances from the IP to the sextupoles are chosen to eliminate a second order chromatic aberration. The application of the localized chromatic correction is demonstrated using as an example the lattice design …

Ozone processing is one of several technologies being developed to meet the intent of the Secretary of the US Department of Energy, Decision on the Programmatic Approach and Near-Term Actions for Management and Disposal of Hanford Tank Waste Decision Statement, dated December 20, 1991, which emphasizes the need to resolve tank safety issues by destroying or modifying the constituents (e.g., organics) that cause safety concerns. As a result, the major tank treatment objectives on the Hanford Site are to resolve the tank safety issues regarding organic compounds (and accompanying flammable gas generation), which all potentially can react to evolve heat and gases. This report contains scoping test results of an alkaline ozone oxidation process to destroy organic compounds found in the Hanford Site`s radioactive waste storage tanks.

Test hole USW UZ-6, located 1.8 kilometers west of the Nevada Test Site on a major north-trending ridge at Yucca Mountain, was dry drilled in Tertiary tuff to a depth of 575 meters. The area near this site is being considered by the US Department of Energy for potential construction of a high-level, radioactive-waste repository. Test hole USW UZ-6 is one of seven test holes completed in the unsaturated zone as part of the US Geological Survey`s Yucca Mountain Project to characterize the potential repository site. Data pertaining to borehole drilling and construction, lithology of geologic units penetrated, and laboratory analyses for hydrologic characteristics of samples of drill-bit cuttings are included in this report.

The first year of the research program involved evaluating the applications of high transition temperature superconducting devices at the Savannah River Site and initiating the development of high {Tc} circuit elements that might be of use in programs at the site. Although during the course of this year there were major changes in the direction of and areas of interest at the Savannah River Site, it has been possible to accomplish the first year goals. The technology required to produce a useful nitrogen temperature SQUID for applications such as those that might be encountered at the site has developed more rapidly than was anticipated. This has made it possible to begin the initial studies with a high {Tc} device as opposed to starting with the helium temperature SQUID. This will have an important impact on the outcome of the project by allowing for a more complete evaluation of a device that can be used in an industrial situation. The goals of the first year of the project are listed and will be addressed in this report.

The Weibull distribution is widely used in reliability literature as a distribution of time to failure, as it allows for both increasing failure rate (IFR) and decreasing failure rate (DFR) models. It has also been used to develop models for an engineered barrier system (EBS), which is known to be one of the key components in a deep geological repository for high level radioactive waste (HLW). The EBS failure time can more realistically be modelled by an IFR distribution, since the failure rate for the EBS is not expected to decrease with time. In this paper, an IFR distribution is used to develop a reliability model for the EBS.

This manual covers the following hardware: Allen-Bradley 6008 -- SV VMEbus I/O scanner; Allen-Bradley universal I/O chassis 1771-A1B, -A2B, -A3B, and -A4B; Allen-Bradley power supply module 1771-P4S; Allen-Bradley 1771-ASB remote I/O adapter module; Allen-Bradley 1771-IFE analog input module; Allen-Bradley 1771-OFE analog output module; Allen-Bradley 1771-IG(D) TTL input module; Allen-Bradley 1771-OG(d) TTL output; Allen-Bradley 1771-IQ DC selectable input module; Allen-Bradley 1771-OW contact output module; Allen-Bradley 1771-IBD DC (10--30V) input module; Allen-Bradley 1771-OBD DC (10--60V) output module; Allen-Bradley 1771-IXE thermocouple/millivolt input module; and the Allen-Bradley 2705 RediPANEL push button module.