Due to the high volume and complexity of its work, Congress divides its tasks among approximately 44 committees with 154 subcommittees. The House and Senate each has its own committee systems, which are similar. Within chamber guidelines, however, each committee adopts its own rules; thus, there is considerable variation among panels.

This report details the information related to Global Climate Change. The contents include the Greenhouse effect and Global warming, Greenhouse gases, international action, and Congressional interest and activities.

The U.N. Development Program (UNDP) coordinates and provides funding for most U.N. development assistance programs. In FY1994, the U.S. contribution of $116 million made the United States the largest donor, comprising about 12 percent of the agency's budget.

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 Information published in the Texas Register includes proposed, adopted, withdrawn and emergency rule actions, notices of state agency review of agency rules, governor's appointments, attorney general opinions, and miscellaneous documents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.

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 Information published in the Texas Register includes proposed, adopted, withdrawn and emergency rule actions, notices of state agency review of agency rules, governor's appointments, attorney general opinions, and miscellaneous documents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.

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 Information published in the Texas Register includes proposed, adopted, withdrawn and emergency rule actions, notices of state agency review of agency rules, governor's appointments, attorney general opinions, and miscellaneous documents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.

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, Jim Mattox, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Authority of the Spencer Road Public Utility District to buy land for a public park (RQ-1814)

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 board of trustees of an independent school district must hold both “open” and “closed” meetings within the boundaries of the district (ID# 36115)

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 city council member may vote or decide on a zoning matter regarding the subdivision in which the member resides (ID# 38147)

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: Duties of the Psychological Associate Advisory Committee to the State Board of Examiners of Psychologists (ID# 38613)

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 Cornyn, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether the Texas Fire Chiefs' Association, the Texas State Association of Fire Fighters, the State Firemen's and Fire Marshals' Association of Texas, or the Texas Association of Fire Educators is a "trade association" for purposes of section 419.006 of the Government Code.

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the audit report covering the financial statements of the United Service Organizations, Incorporated, for the years ended December 31, 1996 and 1997, focusing on whether the audit report complied with the financial reporting requirements of the law."

Some applications of an Electron Beam Ion Source (EBIS) require intensities of highly charged ions significantly greater than those which have been achieved in present EBIS sources. For example, the ion source for the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) at Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) must be capable of generating 3x10{sup 9} ions of Au{sup 35+} or 2 x 10{sup 9} ions of U{sup 45+} per pulse [1]. In this case, if the fraction of ions of interest is 20% of the total ion space charge, the total extracted charge is {approx}{approx} 5 x 10{sup 11}. It is also desirable to extract these ions in a 10 ps pulse to allow single turn injection into the first synchrotron. Requirements for an EBIS which could meet the needs of the LHC at CERN are similar ({approx} 1.5 x 10{sup 9} ions of Pb{sup 54+} in 5.5 {micro}s). This charge yield is about an order of magnitude greater than that achieved in existing EBIS sources, and is what is meant here by ''high current''. This also implies, then, an EBIS with a high electron beam current. The scope of problems in a high current EBIS is broad, and includes generating a sufficient total …

This paper reports the development of 350 MHz superconducting cavities of a spoke-loaded geometry, intended for the velocity range 0.2 < v/c < 0.6. Two prototype single-cell cavities have been designed, one optimized for velocity v/c = 0.4, and the other for v/c = 0.29. Construction of the prototype niobium cavities is nearly complete. Details of the design and construction are discussed, along with the results of cold tests.

Ukraine operates thirteen (13) Soviet-designed pressurized water reactors, VVERS. All Ukrainian plants are currently operating with annually renewable permits until they update their safety analysis reports (SARs), in accordance with new SAR content requirements issued in September 1995, by the Nuclear Regulatory Authority and the Government Nuclear Power Coordinating Committee of Ukraine. The requirements are in three major areas: design basis accident (DBA) analysis, probabilistic risk assessment (PRA), and beyond design-basis accident (BDBA) analysis. The last two requirements, on PRA and BDBA, are new, and the DBA requirements are an expanded version of the older SAR requirements. The US Department of Energy (USDOE), as part of its Soviet-Designed Reactor Safety activities, is providing assistance and technology transfer to Ukraine to support their nuclear power plants (NPPs) in developing a Western-type technical basis for the new SARs. USDOE sponsored In-Depth Safety Assessments (ISAs) are in progress at three pilot nuclear reactor units in Ukraine, South Ukraine Unit 1, Zaporizhzhya Unit 5, and Rivne Unit 1, and a follow-on study has been initiated at Khmenytskyy Unit 1. The ISA projects encompass most areas of plant safety evaluation, but the initial emphasis is on performing a detailed, plant-specific Level 1 Internal Events PRA. …

Two Forward Time Projection Chambers (FTPC) provide charge and momentum information in the pseudorapidity range between 2.5 < |{eta}| < 4.0. A radial TPC scheme is used, where ionization electrons drift in an electric field perpendicular to the axial solenoidal magnetic field. Curved proportional wire chambers with pad readout record the track information via 19200 electronic channels. We report on measurements with various gas mixtures in a prototype chamber with and without magnetic field. The design and construction of a curved readout chamber is described. Based on the prototype measurements and the final layout of the detector the expected performance in measuring accuracy and two-track-separation is given.

Melting of solid matter under laser radiation is realized in almost every process of laser technology. The present paper addresses melted material flows in cases when melt zones are shallow, i.e., the zone width is appreciably greater than or of the same order as its depth. Such conditions are usually realized when hardening, doping or perforating thin plates or when using none-deep penetration. Melted material flowing under conditions of deep penetration, drilling of deep openings and cutting depends on a number of additional factors (as compared to the shallow-pool case), namely, formation of a vapor and gas cavern in the sample and propagation of the laser beam through the cavern. These extra circumstances complicate hydrodynamic consideration of the liquid bath and will be addressed is the paper to follow.

In evaluating the feasibility of neutron radiography and tomography in the 10-14 MeV region, it is important to estimate the radiation backgrounds that could potentially interfere with the measurements. In this context, backgrounds refer to all counts in the detector other than those due to neutrons transmitted through the sample without scattering. There are two principal sources of backgrounds: (1) neutrons and gammas resulting from incident neutrons interacting in the sample, and (2) events in the detector arising from neutrons scattering in the accelerator vault and collimation system, together with natural and induced activation. Counts due to these backgrounds are spread fairly uniformly across the detector, and therefore do not compromise the ability to identify small features in the sample on the millimeter scale in a tomographic reconstruction; however, they do increase the neutron dose required to achieve sufficient statistical accuracy to reveal features of interest. Backgrounds are generally considered to be tolerable if their count rates are less than or comparable to the rates from the transmitted (uncollided) beam. If they are significantly above this level, they are a potentially serious problem. Understanding radiation backgrounds is thus critically important in determining the required source strength and running time. The …

Measurements by the E802 Collaboration of the A-dependence and pseudorapidity interval ({delta}{eta}) dependence of mid-rapidity ET distributions in a half-azimuth electromagnetic calorimeter are presented for p+Be, p+Au, O+Cu, Si+Au and Au+Au collisions at the BNL-AGS. The issues addressed are (1) whether the shapes of the upper edges of the ET distributions vary with {delta}{eta} similarly to the variation in shapes of mid-rapidity charged particle distributions and (2) how small a {delta}{eta} interval would still give a meaningful characterization of the ''nuclear geometry'' of a reaction. A new way of plotting ET distributions was found from which the reaction dynamics could be read directly.

Lawrence Livermore, Sandia Livermore and Los Alamos National Laboratories have a joint project to develop an optimized hydrogen fueled engine for series hybrid automobiles. The major divisions of responsibility are: system analysis, engine design and kinetics modeling by LLNL; performance and emission testing, and friction reduction by SNL; computational fluid mechanics and combustion modeling by LANL. This project is a component of the Department of Energy, Office of Utility Technology, National Hydrogen Program. We report here on the progress on system analysis and preliminary engine testing. We have done system studies of series hybrid automobiles that approach the PNGV design goal of 34 km/liter (80 mpg), for 384 km (240 mi) and 608 km (380 mi) ranges. Our results indicate that such a vehicle appears feasible using an optimized hydrogen engine. The impact of various on-board storage options on fuel economy are evaluated. Experiments with an available engine at the Sandia Combustion Research Facility demonstrated NO{sub x} emissions of 10 to 20 ppm at an equivalence ratio of 0.4, rising to about 500 ppm at 0.5 equivalence ratio using neat hydrogen. Hybrid vehicle simulation studies indicate that exhaust NO{sub x} concentrations must be less than 180 ppm to meet the …

Electrochemical capacitative behavior of carbon aerogels and commercial carbon fiber cloths was studied in 5M KOH, 3M sulfuric acid, and 0.5M tetrethylammonium tetrafluoroborate/propylene carbonate electrolytes. The resorcinol-formaldehyde based carbon aerogels with a range of denisty (0.2-0.85 g/cc) have open-cell structures with ultrafine pore sizes (5-50 nm), high surface area (400-700 m{sup 2}/g), and a solid matrix composed of interconnected particles or fibers with characteristic diameters of 10 nm. The commercial fiber cloths in the density range 0.2-04g/cc have high surface areas (1000-2500 m{sup 2}/g). The volumetric capacitances of high-density aerogels are shown to be comparable to or exceeding those from activated carbon fibers. Electrochemical behavior of these materials in various electrolytes is compared and related to their physical properties.

The Department of Energy (Department), Nevada Operations office (Nevada) is responsible for following established policy in obtaining necessary support services through its Contract Management Division. The objective of the audit was to determine whether Nevada and its Management and Operating (M&O) contractors were following Federal and Department policies with regard to directed support service subcontracts. The audit showed that program offices in Nevada and Headquarters were directing the Nevada M&O contractor to award subcontracts to specific companies or individuals. The subcontractors reported either directly to a program office or to a national laboratory. Furthermore, the subcontractors` work products were delivered directly to the requesting program office. The M&O contractor had only administrative responsibility for the subcontracts awarded. This occurred because Nevada had not established adequate internal controls over the process of procuring support service. As a result, the M&O contractor was paid a higher award fee for managing the Department`s contracts and may have incurred additional costs in staffing its procurement office. We recommended that the Manager, Nevada Operations Office, discontinue directed support service subcontracts to its M&O contractor and act to strengthen internal controls over subcontracting. Nevada management partially concurred with the recommendations but did not believe the directed …

An international team was assembled for the purpose of selecting suitable immobilization forms and processing technologies for the Fissile Materials Deposition Program Office. As a reference point, the team used the NAS study but did not limit their recommendations to those of the NAS. As a result, two basic forms were selected and the processing alternatives to provide those two forms were defined. Environmental data have been supplied to support a preliminary environmental impact statement for the disposition program. The immobilization program has also entered the R&D Phase and progress has been made on the formulation of both glass and ceramic forms. Samples of both glass and ceramics containing tens of grams of plutonium have been prepared which indicate that the required concentration range can be obtained. Long-term leach tests to verify performance requirements in the repository are also under way.

This paper examined effects of heat treatment and milling (before or after heat treatment) on the (electrochemical) intercalating ability of needle petroleum coke; natural graphite particles are included for comparison. 1 tab, 4 figs, 7 refs.