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 Information published in the Texas Register includes proposed, adopted, withdrawn and emergency rule actions, notices of state agency review of agency rules, governor's appointments, attorney general opinions, and miscellaneous documents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

Daily publication of the U.S. Office of the Federal Register contains rules and regulations, proposed legislation and rule changes, and other notices, including "Presidential proclamations and Executive Orders, Federal agency documents having general applicability and legal effect, documents required to be published by act of Congress, and other Federal agency documents of public interest" (p. ii). Table of Contents starts on page iii.

This report discusses how funding affects the America COMPETES program, and subsequently U.S. interests in R&D in STEM disciplines.

This report discusses the proposed U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement (CFTA) signed November 22, 2006, which has not yet been approved by Congress. It includes an overview of the proposed CFTA and U.S.-Colombia trade, background on Colombia, issues for Congress to consider, Colombia's plan to improve labor rights, and the actions that Colombia has already taken to improve violence, labor, and human rights within the country.

This report summarizes how insolvent states may borrow funds from the federal account within the Unemployment Trust Fund (UTF) to meet their unemployment compensation (UC) benefits obligations.

This report covers the background and current state of the relationship of the United States with the Republic of Korea (ROK, formerly South Korea), including economic and trade issues, North Korea, naval, and military events. It is a general overview of the current state of relations with South Korea.

One of the most persistent political issues facing Congress in recent decades is whether to require that the budget of the United States be in balance. Although a balanced federal budget has long been held as a political ideal, the accumulation of large deficits in recent years has heightened concern that some action to require a balance between revenues and expenditures may be necessary. This report provides an overview of the issues and options that have been raised during prior consideration of proposals for a balanced budget constitutional amendment.

This report looks at budget requests for the Army's Future Combat System (FCS) program, Ground Combat Vehicle (GCV) program, and brigade combat teams (BCTs). It ends with a discussion of potential issues for Congress.

The responsibility for populating top positions in the executive and judicial branches of government is shared, with the President having the power of appointment and the Senate having the power of advice and consent. This report provides a brief background on advice and consent issues, an overview of the appointment process in both the executive and legislative branches, and a brief discussion of recent concerns about the system. Next, the report explores the events in the 112th Congress leading up to the introduction and Senate action on S. 679 and S.Res. 116, and concludes with an analysis of the two measures.

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Social Security Statement (the statement) is the federal government's main document for communicating with more than 150 million workers about their Social Security benefits. Provided annually, it serves as a key financial literacy tool that can educate the public about Social Security Administration (SSA) program benefits, aid in financial planning, and ensure that workers' earnings records are complete and accurate. The statement is also a key tool for communicating with the public about the long-term financial challenges the Social Security system faces. However, due to budget constraints, SSA chose to suspend mailings of the statement in March 2011. GAO examined (1) the current status of the statement and (2) ways SSA plans to improve the usefulness of the statement. To address these issues, GAO interviewed SSA officials and reviewed agency documents and our prior work on the statement's understandability. GAO also provided a draft of this testimony to SSA for review and comment."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of State (State) has implemented a custom application called iPost and a risk scoring program that is intended to provide continuous monitoring capabilities of information security risk to elements of its information technology (IT) infrastructure. Continuous monitoring can facilitate nearer real-time risk management and represents a significant change in the way information security activities have been conducted in the past. GAO was asked to determine (1) the extent to which State has identified and prioritized risk to the department in its risk scoring program; (2) how agency officials use iPost information to implement security improvements; (3) the controls for ensuring the timeliness, accuracy, and completeness of iPost information; and (4) the benefits and challenges associated with implementing iPost. To do this, GAO analyzed program documentation and compared it to relevant standards, interviewed and surveyed department officials, and performed analyses on iPost data."

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The Savannah River Site (SRS) has the analytical measurement capability to perform high-precision plutonium concentration measurements by controlled-potential coulometry. State-of-the-art controlled-potential coulometers were designed and fabricated by the Savannah River National Laboratory and installed in the Analytical Laboratories process control laboratory. The Analytical Laboratories uses coulometry for routine accountability measurements of and for verification of standard preparations used to calibrate other plutonium measurement systems routinely applied to process control, nuclear safety, and other accountability applications. The SRNL Coulometer has a demonstrated measurement reliability of {approx}0.05% for 10 mg samples. The system has also been applied to the characterization of neptunium standard solutions with a comparable reliability. The SRNL coulometer features: a patented current integration system; continuous electrical calibration versus Faraday's Constants and Ohm's Law; the control-potential adjustment technique for enhanced application of the Nernst Equation; a wide operating room temperature range; and a fully automated instrument control and data acquisition capability. Systems have been supplied to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Russia, Japanese Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) and the New Brunswick Laboratory (NBL). The most recent vintage of electronics was based on early 1990's integrated circuits. Many of the components are no longer available. At the request of the …

Glycolic acid and sugar are being considered as potential candidates to substitute for much of the formic acid currently being added to the Defense Waste Processing Facility (DWPF) melter feed as a reductant. A series of small-scale melter tests were conducted at the Vitreous State Laboratory (VSL) in January 2011 to collect necessary data for the assessment of the impact of these alternate reductants on the melter off-gas flammability. The DM10 melter with a 0.021 m{sup 2} melt surface area was run with three different feeds which were prepared at SRNL based on; (1) the baseline formic/nitric acid flowsheet, (2) glycolic/formic/nitric acid flowsheet, and (3) sugar/formic/nitric acid flowsheet - these feeds will be called the baseline, glycolic, and sugar flowsheet feeds, respectively, hereafter. The actual addition of sugar to the sugar flowsheet feed was made at VSL before it was fed to the melter. For each feed, the DM10 was run under both bubbled (with argon) and non-bubbled conditions at varying melter vapor space temperatures. The goal was to lower its vapor space temperature from nominal 500 C to less than 300 C at 50 C increments and maintain steady state at each temperature at least for one hour, preferentially …

Waste Solidification Engineering (WSE) has requested that characterization and a radioactive demonstration of the next batch of sludge slurry (Sludge Batch 7a*) be completed in the Shielded Cells Facility of the Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) via a Technical Task Request (TTR). This characterization and demonstration, or sludge batch qualification process, is required prior to transfer of the sludge from Tank 51 to the Defense Waste Processing Facility (DWPF) feed tank (Tank 40). The current WSE practice is to prepare sludge batches in Tank 51 by transferring sludge from other tanks. Discharges of nuclear materials from H Canyon are often added to Tank 51 during sludge batch preparation. The sludge is washed and transferred to Tank 40, the current DWPF feed tank. Prior to transfer of Tank 51 to Tank 40, SRNL simulates the Tank Farm and DWPF processes with a Tank 51 sample (referred to as the qualification sample). Sludge Batch 7a (SB7a) is composed of portions of Tanks 4, 7, and 12; the Sludge Batch 6 heel in Tank 51; and a plutonium stream from H Canyon. SRNL received the Tank 51 qualification sample (sample ID HTF-51-10-125) following sludge additions to Tank 51. This report documents: (1) The …

The Savannah River Site (SRS) is preparing Tank 5F for closure. The first step in preparing the tank for closure is mechanical sludge removal. Following mechanical sludge removal, SRS performed chemical cleaning with oxalic acid to remove the sludge heel. Personnel are currently assessing the effectiveness of the chemical cleaning to determine whether the tank is ready for closure. SRS personnel collected liquid samples during chemical cleaning and submitted them to Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) for analysis. Following chemical cleaning, they collected a solid sample (also known as 'process sample') and submitted it to SRNL for analysis. The authors analyzed these samples to assess the effectiveness of the chemical cleaning process. Analysis of the anions showed the measured oxalate removed from Tank 5F to be approximately 50% of the amount added in the oxalic acid. To close the oxalate mass balance, the author collected solid samples, leached them with nitric acid, and measured the concentration of cations and anions in the leachate.

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