Eltron Research Inc. and team members CoorsTek, Sued Chemie, and Argonne National Laboratory are developing an environmentally benign, inexpensive, and efficient method for separating hydrogen from gas mixtures produced during industrial processes, such as coal gasification. This project was motivated by the National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL) Vision 21 initiative, which seeks to economically eliminate environmental concerns associated with the use of fossil fuels. Currently, this project is focusing on four basic categories of dense membranes: (i) mixed conducting ceramic/ceramic composites, (ii) mixed conducting ceramic/metal (cermet) composites, (iii) cermets with hydrogen permeable metals, and (iv) hydrogen permeable alloys. Ultimately, these materials must enable hydrogen separation at practical rates under ambient and high-pressure conditions, without deactivation in the presence of feedstream components such as carbon dioxide, water, and sulfur. This report describes resent results for long-term hydrogen permeation and chemical stability measurements, new mixed conducting cermets, progress in cermet, thin film, and thin-walled tube fabrication, hydrogen absorption measurements for selected compositions, and membrane facilitated alkane to olefin conversion.

The composition of a steam phase in equilibrium with a water phase at high temperature is remarkably affected by the varying capabilities of the water phase constituents to partition into the steam. Ionic impurities (sodium, chloride, sulfate, etc.) tend to remain in the water phase, while weakly ionic or gaseous species (oxygen) partition into the steam. Analysis of the water phase can provide misleading results concerning the steam phase composition or environment. This paper describes efforts that were made to use novel electrochemical probes and sampling techniques to directly characterize a wet steam phase environment in equilibrium with high temperature water. Probes were designed to make electrochemical measurements in the thin film of water existing on exposed surfaces in steam over a water phase. Some of these probes were referenced against a conventional high temperature electrode located in the water phase. Others used two different materials (typically tungsten and platinum) to make measurements without a true reference electrode. The novel probes were also deployed in a steam space removed from the water phase. It was necessary to construct a reservoir and an external, air-cooled condenser to automatically keep the reservoir full of condensed steam. Conventional reference and working electrodes were …

Throughout the utility industry, there is high interest in subsurface imaging of plastic, ceramic, and metallic objects because of the cost, reliability, and safety benefits available in avoiding impacts with the existing infrastructure and in reducing inappropriate excavations. Industry interest in locating plastic pipe has resulted in funding available for the development of technologies that enable this imaging. Gas Technology Institute (GTI) proposes to develop a compact and inexpensive capacitive tomography imaging sensor that takes the form of a flat plate or flexible mat that can be placed on the ground to image objects embedded in the soil. A compact, low-cost sensor that can image objects through soil could be applied to multiple operations and will produce a number of cost savings for the gas industry. In a stand-alone mode, it could be used to survey an area prior to excavation. The technology would improve the accuracy and reliability of any operation that involves excavation by locating or avoiding buried objects. An accurate subsurface image of an area will enable less costly keyhole excavations and other cost-saving techniques. Ground penetrating radar (GPR) has been applied to this area with limited success. Radar requires a high-frequency carrier to be injected into …

The Petroleum Technology Transfer Council (PTTC) continued pursuing its mission of helping U.S. independent oil and natural gas producers make timely, informed technology decisions. Networking opportunities that occur with a Houston Headquarters (HQ) location are increasing name awareness. Focused efforts by Executive Director Don Duttlinger to interact with large independents, national service companies and some majors are continuing to supplement the support base of the medium to smaller industry participants around the country. PTTC is now involved in many of the technology-related activities that occur in high oil and natural gas activity areas. Access to technology remains the driving force for those who do not have in-house research and development capabilities and look to the PTTC to provide services and options for increased efficiency.

Avoidance of poorly installed HVAC systems is best accomplished at the close of construction by having a building and its systems put ''through their paces'' with a well conducted commissioning process. This research project focused on developing key components to enable the development of tools that will automatically detect and correct equipment operating problems, thus providing continuous and automatic commissioning of the HVAC systems throughout the life of a facility. A study of pervasive operating problems reveled the following would most benefit from an automated and continuous commissioning process: (1) faulty economizer operation; (2) malfunctioning sensors; (3) malfunctioning valves and dampers, and (4) access to project design data. Methodologies for detecting system operation faults in these areas were developed and validated in ''bare-bones'' forms within standard software such as spreadsheets, databases, statistical or mathematical packages. Demonstrations included flow diagrams and simplified mock-up applications. Techniques to manage data were demonstrated by illustrating how test forms could be populated with original design information and the recommended sequence of operation for equipment systems. Proposed tools would use measured data, design data, and equipment operating parameters to diagnosis system problems. Steps for future research are suggested to help more toward practical application of automated …

The D0 experiment is recording physics quality data. Both the detector and the accelerator performance are continually improving. We are studying issues such as the b{bar b} mass resolution, b-jet tagging efficiency, missing E{sub T} resolution, and backgrounds to Higgs processes. We look forward to seeing exciting results. The status of the Higgs search at the upgraded D0 detector is discussed.

DOE prepared an environmental assessment (EA)for wildland fire management activities on the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory (INEEL) (DOE/EA-1372). The EA was developed to evaluate wildland fire management options for pre-fire, fire suppression, and post fire activities. Those activities have an important role in minimizing the conversion of the native sagebrush steppe ecosystem found on the INEEL to non-native weeds. Four alternative management approaches were analyzed: Alternative 1 - maximum fire protection; Alternative 2 - balanced fire protection; Alternative 2 - balanced fire protection; Alternative 3 - protect infrastructure and personnel; and Alternative 4 - no action/traditional fire protection.

An active-surface membrane technology was used to separate a die lube manufacturing wastewater stream consisting of various oils, hydrocarbons, heavy metals, and silicones. The ultrafiltration membranes reduced organics from initial oil and grease contents by 20�25X, carbon oxygen demand (COD) by 1.5 to 2X, and total organic carbon (TOC) by 0.6, while the biological oxygen demand (BOD) remained constant. The active-surface membranes were not fouled as badly as non-active-surface systems and the active-surface membrane flux levels were consistently higher and more stable than those of the non-active-surface membranes tested. Field testing demonstrated that the rotary microfilter can concentrate the die lube, i.e. remove the glycerin component, and produce a die lube suitable for recycling. The recycling system operated for six weeks with only seven cleaning cycles and no mechanical or electrical failures. Test data and quality records indicate that the die casting scrap was reduced from 8.4 to 7.8%. There is no doubt that this test yielded tremendous results. This separation process presents significant opportunities that can be evaluated further.

The Cyclic Material Properties Test was structured to obtain and provide experimental data for determining cyclic hardening/softening characteristics of HY-80 steel. The inelastic strain history data generated by this test program and the resulting cyclic stress-strain curve will be used to enhance material models in the finite element codes used to perform nonlinear elastic-plastic analysis.

In May 2002, the United States Department of Energy (DOE) signed Assistance Instrument Number DE-FC09-02CH11109 with the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) to support the Environmental Biosciences Program (EBP). This funding instrument replaces DOE Assistance Instrument Number DE-FC02-98CH10902. EBP is an integrated, multidisciplinary scientific program, employing a range of research initiatives to identify, study and resolve environmental health risk issues. These initiatives are consistent with the Medical University's role as a comprehensive state-supported health sciences institution and the nation's need for new and better approaches to the solution of a complex and expansive array of environment-related health problems. The intrinsic capabilities of a comprehensive health sciences institution enable the Medical University to be a national resource for the scientific investigation of environmental health issues. EBP's success in convening worldwide scientific expertise is due in part to the inherent credibility the Medical University brings to the process of addressing these complex issues.

The subject technology, the Calcpos Rotary Burner (CRB), is a burner that is proposed to reduce energy consumption and emission levels in comparison to currently available technology. burners are used throughout industry to produce the heat that is required during the refining process. Refineries seek to minimize the use of energy in refining while still meeting EPA regulations for emissions.

In full-scale boilers, the effect of biomass cofiring on NO{sub x} and unburned carbon (UBC) emissions has been found to be site-specific. Few sets of field data are comparable and no consistent database of information exists upon which cofiring fuel choice or injection system design can be based to assure that NOX emissions will be minimized and UBC be reduced. This report presents the results of a comprehensive project that generated an extensive set of pilot-scale test data that were used to validate a new predictive model for the cofiring of biomass and coal. All testing was performed at the 3.6 MMBtu/hr (1.75 MW{sub t}) Southern Company Services/Southern Research Institute Combustion Research Facility where a variety of burner configurations, coals, biomasses, and biomass injection schemes were utilized to generate a database of consistent, scalable, experimental results (422 separate test conditions). This database was then used to validate a new model for predicting NO{sub x} and UBC emissions from the cofiring of biomass and coal. This model is based on an Advanced Post-Processing (APP) technique that generates an equivalent network of idealized reactor elements from a conventional CFD simulation. The APP reactor network is a computational environment that allows for the …

Advanced Technology Systems, Inc. (ATS), with Desert Research Institute (DRI) and Ohio University as subcontractors, was contracted by the NETL in September 1998 to manage the Upper Ohio River Valley Project (UORVP), with a goal of characterizing the ambient fine particulate in this region, including examination of urban/rural variations, correlations between PM{sub 2.5} and gaseous pollutants, and influences of artifacts on PM{sub 2.5} measurements in this region. Two urban and two rural monitoring sites were included in the UORVP. The four sites selected were all part of existing local and/or state air quality programs. One urban site was located in the Lawrenceville section of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania at an air quality monitoring station operated by the Allegheny County Health Department. A second urban site was collocated at a West Virginia Division of Environmental Protection (WVDEP) monitoring station at the airport in Morgantown, West Virginia. One rural site was collocated with the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (PADEP) at a former NARSTO-Northeast site near Holbrook, Greene County, Pennsylvania. The other rural site was collocated at a site operated by the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency (OHEPA) and managed by the Ohio State Forestry Division in Gifford State Forest near Athens, Ohio. Analysis of …

This is the second quarterly report of the ''Multi-Pollutant Control Using Membrane-Based Upflow Wet Electrostatic Precipitation'' project funded by the US Department of Energy's National Energy Technology Laboratory under DOE Award No. DE-FC26-02NT41592 to Croll-Reynolds Clean Air Technologies (CRCAT). In this 18 month project, CRCAT and its team members will conduct detailed emission tests of metallic and new membrane collection material within a wet electrostatic precipitator (WESP) at First Energy's Penn Power's Bruce Mansfield (BMP) plant in Shippingport, Pa. Test results performed on the existing metallic WESP during November of 2002 showed consistent results with previous test results. Average collection efficiency of 89% on SO{sub 3} mist was achieved. Additionally, removal efficiencies of 62% were achieved at very high velocity, greater than 15 ft./sec. During the first quarter of 2003 final design and start of fabrication of the membrane wet ESP was undertaken.

During the period January 1, 2003--March 31, 2003, Allegheny Energy Supply Co., LLC (Allegheny) proceeded with improvements to both the Willow Island and Albright Generating Station cofiring systems. These improvements were designed to increase the resource base for the projects, and to address issues that came up during the first year of operations. This report summarizes the activities associated with the Designer Opportunity Fuel program, and demonstrations at Willow Island and Albright Generating Stations.

This paper presents preliminary findings from DOEs pilot program. The results show how a web-based monitoring system can form the basis for aggregation of data and correlation and benchmarking across broad geographical lines. A longer report describes additional findings from the pilot, including impacts of power quality and reliability on customers operations [Divan, Brumsickle, Eto 2003].

Experiments on the flow loop are continuing. Improvements to the software for data acquisition are being made as additional experience with three-phase flow is gained. Modifications are being made to the Cuttings Injection System in order to improve control and the precision of cuttings injection. The design details for a drill-pipe Rotation System have been completed. A US Patent was filed on October 28, 2002 for a new design for an instrument that can generate a variety of foams under elevated pressures and temperatures and then transfer the test foam to a viscometer for measurements of viscosity. Theoretical analyses of cuttings transport phenomena based on a layered model is under development. Calibrations of two nuclear densitometers have been completed. Baseline tests have been run to determine wall roughness in the 4 different tests sections (i.e. 2-in, 3-in, 4-in pipes and 5.76-in by 3.5-in annulus) of the flow loop. Tests have also been conducted with aerated fluids at EPET conditions. Preliminary experiments on the two candidate aqueous foam formulations were conducted which included rheological tests of the base fluid and foam stability reports. These were conducted after acceptance of the proposal on the Study of Cuttings Transport with Foam Under Elevated …

This final report describes the progress during the contract period March 1, 1998 through April 30, 2003, on the design, development, and testing of a novel mixed-refrigerant-based 1000 gal/day natural gas liquefier, together with the associated gas cleanup equipment. Based on the work, it is concluded that a cost-effective 1000 gal/day liquefaction system is technically and economically feasible. A unit based on the same developed technology, with 5000 gal/day capacity, would have much improved economics.

Ab initio Quantum mechanics calculations of the equation of states for BaZrO{sub 3} have been performed and the bulk modulus has been obtained. The value of the modulus is in good agreement with reported experimental values. Equilibrium proton positions in Y-doped BaZrO{sub 3} with dopant concentrations from 12.5 to 50% were investigated. Initial rough estimates of the transition barriers have been made. Our results suggest that the proton migration pathway may involve secondary minima with two maxima (symmetric with respect to the center of the path). In the next phase of this project the results of our quantum mechanical calculations will be used to develop a new Reactive Force Field (ReaxFF) based on first principles. This Reactive Force Field will be used for much molecular dynamics simulations or much larger systems to investigate proton migration in bulk and surface regions of fuel cells.

This is the tenth Quarterly Technical Report for DOE Cooperative Agreement No: DE-FC26-00NT40954. The goal of the project is to develop and demonstrate a software framework to enable virtual simulation of Vision 21 plants. During the last quarter much progress was made in software development. The CO wrapper template was developed for the integration of Alstom Power proprietary code INDVU. The session management tasks were completed. The multithreading capability was made functional so that user of the integrated simulation may directly interact with the CFD software. The V21-Controller and the Fluent CO wrapper were upgraded to CO v.1.0. The testing and debugging of the upgraded software is ongoing. Testing of the integrated software was continued. A list of suggested GUI enhancements was made. Remote simulation capability was successfully tested using two networked Windows machines. Work on preparing the release version progressed: CFD database was enhanced, a convergence detection capability was implemented, a Configuration Wizard for low-order models was developed, and the Configuration Wizard for Fluent was enhanced. During the last quarter good progress was made in software demonstration. Various simplified versions of Demo Case 1 were used to debug Configuration Wizard and V21-Controller. The heat exchanger model in FLUENT was …

This is the third quarterly technical report for the RP-5 Renewable Energy Efficiency Project. The report summarizes the work progress, effort and activities that took place during the period of January 1, 2003 to March 31, 2003. The report has been prepared in accordance with the Department of Energy (DOE) Guidelines. This technical report covers all meetings, discussions, and engineering and design activities that took place to complete the conceptual design phase and finalize the scope of work for the project. As indicated in the previous reports, CH2M Hill, the Public Interest Energy Research (PIER) Consultant, is in charge of the analysis and evaluation of the innovative equipment and systems for the project. The PIER Consultant has submitted to Inland empire Utilities Agency (IEUA) the draft Conceptual Design Report for review and comments. IEUA has prepared a detailed scope of work for the whole project, which will be used by the consultant as a basis and a reference for submitting their proposal for the engineering and design services. This report also includes engineering work and procurement of vital equipment which is part of the new IEUA Headquarters Building's chilled water system. IEUA has performed a detailed technical and economical analysis …

The objectives of the first year of phase 2 of the program are to construct and operate an engineering pilot reactor for OTM oxygen. Work to support this objective is being undertaken in the following areas in this quarter: Element reliability; Element fabrication; Systems technology; Power recovery; and IGCC process analysis and economics. The major accomplishments this quarter were Preferred OTM architectures have been identified through stress analysis; and The 01 reactor was operated at target flux and target purity for 1000 hours.

This project was designed to comprehensively investigate the effects of molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) growth variations upon tensile-strained films. Using two dimensional (2-D) structures, such as quantum wells of variable configurations, we worked to observe the electro-optical response of polarization independence. The latter had been studied for compressively strained systems. However, the proof of principle for the feasibility of tensile-strained single and double quantum wells, particularly in the GaAs as opposed to the InP material system, had been much less investigated by comparison. The significance of this project, from a Basic Energy Sciences perspective, has been in its contribution to the understanding of how MBE parameters and sample design effect the physics of strained materials which themselves have been tailored to react with polarization insensitivity. Fundamental issues of materials structure control, growth parameter modifications, and characterization methods were investigated. Both single and double quantum well systems were used with both symmetric and asymmetric well widths for the latter. In this work, we essentially investigated both the growth of and potential applications for quantum based structures that use tensile strain to induce polarization independence.

The Final Technical Report summarizes research accomplishments and Publications in the period of 5/1/99 to 4/30/03 done on the grant. Extensive progress was made in the period covered by this report in the areas of chemical kinetics of non-linear systems; spatial structures, reaction - diffusion systems, and thermodynamic and stochastic theory of electrochemical and general systems.