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The Energy Policy Act of 1992 (EPACT) increased competition in the electric generating sector by creating new entities that can generate and sell electricity at wholesale without being regulated as utilities under PUHCA. PURPA began to shift more regulatory responsibilities to the federal government, and EPACT continued that shift away from the states by creating new options for utilities and regulators to meet electricity demand.

In this study we first discuss a pulsed EPR experiment designed to establish the mechanism of coherence generation [1]. The pulse sequence employed, flash-t-({pi}/2){sub x}-{tau}, consists of a short laser pulse at time zero, followed by a variable period t. At the end of this period a non-ideal ({pi}/2) microwave pulse is applied. The resulting free-induction decay at fixed detection time {tau} is then monitored as a function of successively incremented values of t. For P{sub 700}{sup +} A{sub 1}{sup {minus}} in deuterated and {sup 15}N-substituted PSI preparations, the transverse magnetization shows an oscillatory dependence on the delay between the laser and the microwave pulse [1]. Apparently, there are fast initial oscillations which disappear 250 ns after the laser pulse. In addition, slow persisting oscillations with frequencies of a few MHz can be observed. Basically, these slow oscillations represent nuclear coherences initiated by the laser pulse [1].

Argonne National Laboratory is demonstrating the application of electrometallurgical treatment processes to Experimental Breeder Reactor-II spent nuclear fuel. Begun in June 1996, 100 driver fuel assemblies and 25 blanket fuel assemblies will be conditioned during this demonstration project. In order to validate the technical and economic viability of the technology, the Department of Energy has established four success criteria with specific supporting goals. The results from both laboratory-scale and engineering-scale testing are being used to evaluate the processes, products and equipment against the target goals. The interim results have provided confidence that the integrated electrometallurgical processes will prove to be a viable option for treating problematic spent nuclear fuels for geologic disposal.

This document summarizes the information on the historical uses, present status, and the sampling and analysis results of waste stored in Tank 241-B-107. This report supports the requirements of the Tri-Party Agreement Milestone M-44-ISB.

Microstructural examination results are reported for two heats of V-(4-5%) Cr-(4-5%)Ti irradiated in the EBR-II X530 experiment to 4.5 dpa at {approximately}400 C to provide an understanding of the microstructural evolution that may be associated with degradation of mechanical properties. Fine precipitates were observed in high density intermixed with small defect clusters for all conditions examined following the irradiation. The irradiation-induced precipitation does not appear to be affected by preirradiation heat treatment at 950-1125 C. There was no evidence for a significant density of large (diameter >10 nm) dislocation loops or network dislocations. Analytical investigations successfully demonstrated that the precipitates were enriched in titanium, depleted in vanadium and contained no nitrogen. These results are discussed in terms of future alloy development options.

Physical processes that govern the growth kinetics of carbon clusters at high pressure and high temperature are: (a) thermodynamics and structural <i>sp</i>?-to-<i>sp</i>? bonding) changes and (b) cluster diffusion. Our study on item (a) deals with <i>ab initio</i> and semi-empirical quantum mechanical calculations to examine effects of cluster size on the relative stability of graphite and diamond clusters and the energy barrier between the two. We have also made molecular dynamics simulations using the Brenner bond order potential. Kesults show that the melting line of diamond based on the Brenner potential is reasonable and that the liquid structure changes from mostly <i>sp</i>-bonded carbon chains to mostly <i>sp</i>?-bonding over a relatively narrow density interval. Our study on item (b) uses the time-dependent clustor size distribution function obtained from the relevant Smoluchowski equations. The resulting surface contribution to the Gibbs free energy of carbon clusters was implemented in a thermochemical code.

This document provides the work plan for modifications to be made to the first article Process Equipment Skid for the Cold Vacuum Drying (CVD) process. The primary objective is to provide engineering configuration control for any modifications made to the Process Equipment Skid during proof of performance testing at the 306E Facility. Development Control procedures will be used to complete the design drawings and Procurement Specification W-441-Pl-FA. The Process Equipment Skid is a system for removing water and drying Spent Nuclear Fuel contained in Multi-Canister Overpacks. The skid contains the Vacuum Purge System and the Tempered Water System (VPS/TWS). The first article Process Equipment Skid, and subsequent production skids, will later be installed in the Cold Vacuum Drying Facility.

Growth of diamond films from C{sub 60}/Ar microwave discharges results in a nanocrystalline microstructure with crystallite sizes in the range 3-10 nm. Heterogeneous nucleation rates of 10{sup 10} cm{sup {minus}2} sec are required to account for the results. The nucleation mechanism presented here fulfills this requirement and is based on the insertion of carbon dimer, C{sub 2}, molecules, produced by fragmentation of C{sub 60}, into the n-bonded dimer rows of the reconstructed (100) surface of diamond. Density functional theory is used to calculate the energetic of C{sub 2} insertion into carbon clusters that model the (100) surface. The reaction of singlet C{sub 2} with the double bond of the C{sub 9}H{sub 12} cluster leads to either carbene structures or a cyclobutynelike structure. At the HF/6-31G* level, the carbene product has a C{sub 2v} structure, while at the B3LYP/6-31G* levels of theory, it has a C{sub s} structure with the inserted C{sub 2} tilted. No barrier for insertion into the C=C double bond of the C{sub 9}H{sub 12} cluster was found at the HF/6-31G* and B3LYP/6-31G* levels of theory. Thus, calculations including correlation energy and geometry optimization indicate that insertion of C{sub 2} into a C=C double bond leads to a …

Initial results are reported for the anode behavior of spent metallic nuclear fuel in an electrorefining process. The anode behavior has been characterized in terms of the initial spent fuel composition and the final composition of the residual cladding hulls. A variety of results have been obtained depending on the experimental conditions. Some of the process variables considered are average and maximum cell voltage, average and maximum anode voltage, amount of electrical charge passed (coulombs or amp-hours) during the experiment, and cell resistance. The main goal of the experiments has been the nearly complete dissolution of uranium with the retention of zirconium and noble metal fission products in the cladding hulls. Analysis has shown that the most indicative parameters for determining an endpoint to the process, recognizing the stated goal, are the maximum anode voltage and the amount of electrical charge passed. For the initial experiments reported here, the best result obtained is greater than 98% uranium dissolution with approximately 50% zirconium retention. Noble metal fission product retention appears to be correlated with zirconium retention.

Objectivity federated databases may contain many terabytes of data and span thousands of files. In such an environment, it is often easy for a user to pose a query that may return an iterator over millions of objects, requiring opening thousands of databases. This presentation describes several technologies developed for such settings: (1) a query estimator, which tells the user how many objects satisfy the query, and how many databases will be touched, prior to opening all of those files; (2) an order-optimized iterator, which behaves like an ordinary iterator except that elements are returned in an order optimized for efficient access, presorted by the database (and container) in which they reside; (3) a parallel implementation of the order-optimized iterator, allowing any number of processes in a parallel or distributed system to iterate over disjoint subcollections of terms satisfying the query, partitioned by the database or container in which the items reside. These technologies have been developed for scientific experiments that will require handling thousands of terabytes of data annually, but they are intended to be applicable in other massive data settings as well. In such environments, significant amounts of data will reside on tertiary storage, accessible via Objectivity`s recently-announced …

Operations and material control and accountancy requirements for the Fuel Conditioning Facility demand accurate prediction of the mass flow of spent EBR-II driver fuel into the facility. This requires validated calculational tools that can predict the burnup and isotopic distribution in irradiated Zr-alloy fueled driver assemblies. Detailed core-follow depletion calculations have been performed for an extensive series of EBR-II runs to produce a database of material inventories for the spent fuel to be processed. As this fuel is processed, comparison of calculated values with measured data obtained from samples of this fuel is producing a growing set of validation data. A more extensive set of samples and measurements from the initial processing of irradiated driver fuel has produced valuable estimates of the biases and uncertainties in both the measured and calculated values. Results of these comparisons are presented herein and indicate the calculated values adequately predict the mass flows.

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We have used a femtosecond laser beam to make cuts through small pressed pellets of six common explosives. The laser system, which produces 100 fs pulses of 820 nm light at a repitition rate of 1 kHz, was intitially developed for cutting metal. The advantage of using a femtosecond laser for cutting is that the cutting process transfers virtually no heat to the material that is being cut and produces almost no waste. We used LX-16 explosive (96% PETN/4% FPC 461 binder) for out intial experiments because PETN is one of the most sensitve of the secondary explosives. In some of the experiments the beam first cut through the HE pellet and then through a stainless steel substrate and in other experiments the beam first cut through the stainless steel and then through the pellet. We also cut through pellets that were not backed by a substrate. No evidence of reaction was observed in any of the LX-16 pellets. In addition to LX-16 we cut pellets of LX-14 (95.5% HMX/4.5% Estane), LX-15 (95% HNS/5% Kel-F), LX-17 (92.5% TATB/7.5% Kel-F), PBX-9407 (94% RDX/6% Exon 461), and pressed TNT with no evidence of reaction. The HE was easily cut at low power …

Fig. 1 shows the present layout of the AGS-RHIC accelerator complex. The high intensity proton beam of the AGS is used both for the slow-extracted-beam (SEB) area with many target station to produce secondary beams and the fast-extracted-beam (FEB) line used for the production of muons for the g-2 experiment and for high intensity target testing for the spallation neutron sources and muon production targets for the muon collider. The same FEB line will also be used for the transfer of beam to RHIC. The proton beam intensity in the AGS has increased steadily over the 35 year existence of the AGS, but the most dramatic increase occurred over the last couple of years with the addition of the new AGS Booster[1]. In Fig. 2 the history of the AGS intensity improvements is shown and the major upgrades are indicated. The AGS Booster has one quarter the circumference of the AGS and therefore allows four Booster beam pulses to be stacked in the AGS at an injection energy of 1.5--1.9 GeV. At this increased energy, space charge forces are much reduced and this in turn allows for the dramatic increase in the AGS beam intensity. The 200 MeV LINAC is …

High capacity, reversible, lithium intercalated carbon anodes have been prepared, 855 m.Ah/g, which exceed the capacity for stage 1 lithium intercalated carbon anodes, 372 mAh/g. Since there is very little hydrogen content in the high capacity anode, the fullerene C{sub 60} lattice is used to investigate the nature of lithium ion bonding and spacing between lithiums in endohedral lithium complexes of C{sub 60}. Three lithium-endohedral complexes have been investigated using ab initio molecular orbital calculations involving 2,3 and 5 lithium. The calculated results suggest that lithium cluster formation may be important for achieving the high capacity lithium carbon anodes.

Processing sodium-bonded spent nuclear fuel at the Fuel Conditioning Facility at Argonne National Laboratory-West involves an electrometallurgical process employing a molten LiCl-KCl salt covering a pool of molten cadmium. Previous research has shown that the cadmium dissolves in the salt as a gas, diffuses through the salt layer and vaporizes at the salt surface. This cadmium vapor condenses on cool surfaces, causing equipment operation and handling problems. Using a cadmium vapor trap to condense the cadmium vapors and reflux them back to the electrorefiner has mitigated equipment problems and improved electrorefiner operations.

The goal of the proposed Spallation Neutron Source (SNS) is to provide a short pulse proton beam of about 0.5{micro}s with average beam power of 1MW. To achieve such purpose, a proton storage ring operated at 60Hz with 1 x 10{sup 14} protons per pulse at 1GeV is required. The Accumulator Ring (AR) receives 1msec long H{sup {minus}} beam bunches of 28mA from a 1GeV linac. Scope and design performance goals of the AR are presented. About 1,200 turns of charge exchange injection is needed to accumulate 1mA in the ring. After a brief description of the lattice design and machine performance parameters, space charge related issues, such as: tune shifts, stopband corrections, halo generation and beam collimation etc. is discussed.

The following report describes the design, construction, and checkout of a high-voltage (HV) impulser built for the heavy ion fusion (HIF) project. The purpose of this impulser is to provide an adjustable diode voltage source of sufficient quality and level to allow the optimization of beam transport and accelerator sections of HIF. An elegant, low-impedance, high-energy storage capacitor circuit has been selected for this application. A retrofit to the diode region has been included to provide additional beam stability and a controlled rise time. The critical part of this circuit that is common to all candidates is the impedance matching component. The following report provides a description of the implemented circuit, the basic circuit variables for wave shaping, component screening techniques, resulting operating parameters, diode modifications, operating considerations, and fault protection.

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