A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Social Security is an important social insurance program affecting virtually every American family. It is the foundation of the nation's retirement income system and also provides millions of Americans with disability insurance and survivors' benefits. Over the long term, as the baby boom generation retires, Social Security's financing shortfall presents a major solvency and sustainability challenge. The Chairman of the Senate Special Committee on Aging and the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Finance asked GAO to use its analytic framework to evaluate an illustrative "Trust Fund Exhaustion" scenario under which benefits are reduced proportionately for all beneficiaries by the shortfall in revenues occurring upon exhaustion of the combined Old-Age and Survivors Insurance and Disability Insurance Trust Funds. The analytic framework consists of three basic criteria: (1) the extent to which the proposal achieves sustainable solvency and how it would affect the U.S. economy and the federal budget; (2) the balance struck between the twin goals of income adequacy and individual equity; and (3) how readily changes could be implemented, administered, and explained to the public. The Trust Fund Exhaustion scenario is intended as an analytic …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The decisions that retiring workers make about how and when to draw down their pension plan assets determine in part whether they will have pension income that lasts throughout retirement. Individuals will need pension and other retirement income to sustain them over a longer period of time than in the past. Moreover, the continuing trend towards pension plans with individual accounts has increased participants' responsibility for managing their pension assets during retirement. As such, our objectives were to determine: (1) what benefit payout options and accompanying information pension plans make available to participants at retirement, (2) what benefit payouts plan participants receive at retirement, and (3) the actions available to help retiring participants preserve their pension and retirement savings plan assets."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "From 1990 through 2001, the Department of Defense delivered over $138 billion in services and defense articles--including classified and controlled parts--to foreign governments through its foreign military sales programs. Classified spare parts are restricted for national security reasons, while controlled parts contain technology that the military does not want to release. GAO was asked to review the Air Force's internal controls aimed at preventing countries from requisitioning and receiving classified or controlled spare parts that they are ineligible to receive."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program paid about $35 million recipients in 2002. In recent years, the Social Security Administration (SSA) has identified a general increase in the amount of annual overpayments made to (1) individuals who are found to have violated program residency requirements or (2) recipients who leave the United States and live outside the country for more than 30 consecutive days without informing SSA. This problem has caused concern among both program administrators and policy makers. As such, GAO was asked to determine what is known about the extent to which SSI benefits are improperly paid to individuals who are not present in the United States and to identify any weaknesses in SSA's processes and policies that impede the agency's ability to detect and deter residency violations."

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, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether Occupations Code, section 1704.304, providing that certain persons may not recommend a bail bond surety, an attorney, or a law firm to a criminal defendant, precludes those persons from furnishing a list of attorneys or bail bond sureties (RQ-0022-GA)

RSAP [1] is a computer code for display and manipulation of neutron cross section data and selected SAMMY output. SAMMY [2] is a multilevel R-matrix code for fitting neutron time-of-flight cross-section data using Bayes' method. This users' guide provides documentation for the recently updated RSAP code (version 6). The code has been ported to the Linux platform, and several new features have been added, including the capability to read cross section data from ASCII pointwise ENDF files as well as double-precision PLT output from SAMMY. A number of bugs have been found and corrected, and the input formats have been improved. Input items are parsed so that items may be separated by spaces or commas.

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 …

Historically, most energy models were reasonably equipped to assess the impact of a subsidy or change in taxation, but are often insufficient to assess the impact of more innovative policy instruments. We evaluate the models used to assess future energy use, focusing on industrial energy use. We explore approaches to engineering-economic analysis that could help improve the realism and policy relevance of engineering-economic modeling frameworks. We also explore solutions to strengthen the policy usefulness of engineering-economic analysis that can be built from a framework of multi-disciplinary cooperation. We focus on the so-called ''engineering-economic'' (or ''bottom-up'') models, as they include the amount of detail that is commonly needed to model policy scenarios. We identify research priorities for the modeling framework, technology representation in models, policy evaluation and modeling of decision-making behavior.

A measurement of the t{bar t} cross section at {radical}s = 1.96 TeV is carried out on data samples of {approx}40 pb{sup -1} in dilepton channels (e{mu}, ee and {mu}{mu}) and lepton+jets channels using two complementary approaches: a fully topological analysis and a soft-muon-tag. Overall, 17 events are observed with an expected background of 6.5 {+-} 0.6. This excess corresponds to an observation probability of three standard deviations and the measured t{bar t} cross section is: {sigma}{sub p}{bar p}{yields} t{bar t} = 8.5{sub -3.6}{sup +4.5} (stat) {sub -3.5}{sup +6.3} (sys) {+-} 0.8 (lumi) pb.

This report presents a systematic review of the available data in the TDMS that are relevant to the following intact rock properties: rock tensile strength, Schmidt hammer rebound hardness, and rock triaxial creep. Relevant data are compiled from qualified and unqualified sources into the summary DTNs and these DTNs are evaluated for qualification using the method of corroborating data as defined in AP-SIII.2Q, ''Qualification of Unqualified Data''. This report also presents a summary of the compiled information in the form of descriptive statistics and recommended values that will be contained in a Reference Information Base (RIB) item prepared in accordance with AP-SIII.4Q, ''Development, Review, Online Placement, and Maintenance of Individual Reference Information Base Data Items''. The primary purpose of this report is to produce qualified sets of data that include all relevant intact rock tensile strength, Schmidt hammer rebound hardness, and rock triaxial creep testing done over the course of the Yucca Mountain Project (YMP). A second purpose is to provide a qualified summary (i.e., a RIB data item) of the test results using descriptive statistics. The immediate purpose of the report is to support the data needs of repository design; however, the products are designed to be appropriate for …

Conservation supply curves are a common tool in economic analysis. As such, they provide an important opportunity to include a non-linear representation of technology and technological change in economy-wide models. Because supply curves are closely related to production isoquants, we explore the possibility of using bottom-up technology assessments to inform top-down representations of energy models of the U.S. economy. Based on a recent report by LBNL and ACEEE on emerging industrial technologies within the United States, we have constructed a supply curve for 54 such technologies for the year 2015. Each of the selected technologies has been assessed with respect to energy efficiency characteristics, likely energy savings by 2015, economics, and environmental performance, as well as needs for further development or implementation of the technology. The technical potential for primary energy savings of the 54 identified technologies is equal to 3.54 Quads, or 8.4 percent of the assume d2015 industrial energy consumption. Based on the supply curve, assuming a discount rate of 15 percent and 2015 prices as forecasted in the Annual Energy Outlook2002, we estimate the economic potential to be 2.66 Quads - or 6.3 percent of the assumed forecast consumption for 2015. In addition, we further estimate how …

In order to meet the needs for protons for MINOS and other experiments, substantial improvements will be necessary in the Booster and Main Injector. They have evaluated a number of improvements which would yield an increase in the number of protons on target for NuMI and Mini-BooNE in the years 2005-2008. They outline a possible program of improvements in the Booster and Main Injector which can be implemented in steps over a five year period and which could result in an increase in proton intensity through the Main Injector which is approximately four times what is currently possible. They provide a list of specific improvements and suggest a possible schedule for the implementation.

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Social Security is an important social insurance program affecting virtually every American family. It is the foundation of the nation's retirement income system and also provides millions of Americans with disability insurance and survivors' benefits. Over the long term, as the baby boom generation retires, Social Security's financing shortfall presents a major program solvency and sustainability challenge. The Chairman of the Senate Special Committee on Aging asked GAO to discuss Social Security's long-term financing challenges and the results of GAO's analysis of an illustrative "Trust Fund Exhaustion" scenario. Under this scenario, benefits are reduced proportionately for all beneficiaries by the shortfall in revenues occurring upon exhaustion of the combined Old-Age and Survivors Insurance and Disability Insurance Trust Funds. This scenario was developed for analytic purposes and is not a legal determination of how benefits would be paid in the event of trust fund exhaustion. GAO's analysis used the framework it has developed to analyze the implications of reform proposals. This framework consists of three criteria: (1) the extent to which the proposal achieves sustainable solvency and how it would affect the U.S. economy and the federal budget, (2) …

We describe modeling and simulation of long-range terrestrial laser communications links between static and mobile platforms. Atmospheric turbulence modeling, along with pointing, tracking and acquisition models are combined to provide an overall capability to estimate communications link performance.

Congress annually considers 13 or more appropriation measures, which provide funding for a variety of activities such as national defense, education, disaster assistance, crime programs, and general government operations, such as the administration of most federal agencies. This report details the rules and practices for the consideration of appropriations measures, referred to as the appropriations process.

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This report discusses the geography and military balance on the Korean Peninsula, presents the range of military options that might be applied there to specific U.S. political objectives, and assesses possible consequences. Military options discussed are: status quo, improved defensive posture, enforce sanctions, preemptive strike against nuclear facilities, and preemptive war.

Over the past year, the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) has sponsored four workshops to compare the probabilistic risk assessments (PRAs) of Soviet-designed VVER power plants. The ''International Workshop on Safety of First-Generation VVER-440 Nuclear Power Plants'' was held on May 20-25, 2002, in Piestany, Slovakia. A short follow-on workshop was held in Bratislava, Slovakia, on November 5-6, 2002, to complete the work begun in May. Piestany was the location also for the ''International Workshop on Safety of Second-Generation VVER-440 Nuclear Power Plants'' (September 9-14, 2002) and the ''International Workshop on Safety of VVER-1000 Nuclear Power Plants'' (April 7-12, 2003). The four workshops were held in cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the Nuclear Regulatory Authority of Slovakia (UJD), the Center for Nuclear Safety in Central and Eastern Europe (CENS), and Argonne National Laboratory (ANL). The objectives of the workshops were to identify the impact of the improvements on the core damage frequency; the contribution to the PRA results of different assumptions about events that can occur at the plants; and to understand, identify, and prioritize potential improvements in hardware and plant operation of VVER nuclear power plants. These objectives were achieved based on insights gained from …

The Intelligent Potroom Operation project focuses on maximizing the performance of an aluminum smelter by innovating components for an intelligent manufacturing system. The Intelligent Potroom Advisor (IPA) monitors process data to identify reduction cells exhibiting behaviors that require immediate attention. It then advises operational personnel on those heuristic-based actions to bring the cell back to an optimal operating state in order to reduce the duration and frequency of substandard reduction cell performance referred to as ''Off-Peak Modes'' (OPMs). Techniques developed to identify cells exhibiting OPMs include the use of a finite element model-based cell state estimator for defining the cell's current operating state via advanced cell noise analyses. In addition, rule induction was also employed to identify statistically significant complex behaviors that occur prior to OPMs. The intelligent manufacturing system design, concepts and formalisms developed in this project w ere used as a basis for an intelligent manufacturing system design. Future research will incorporate an adaptive component to automate continuous process improvement, a technology platform with the potential to improve process performance in many of the other Industries of the Future applications as well.

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This report describes the annual appropriations cycle from the President’s submission of his annual budget through enactment of the appropriations measures. It describes the three types of appropriations measures—regular appropriations bills, continuing resolutions, and supplemental bills. It explains the spending ceilings for appropriations bills that are associated with the budget resolution and the sequestration process, including a description of the mechanisms used to enforce the ceilings. It also explains the authorization appropriations process, which prohibits certain provisions in some of the appropriations bills.

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