One of the least controversial provisions of the Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 1975 (P.L. 94-163) established corporate average fuel economy (CAFE) standards for new passenger cars. This report presents a brief background and analysis regarding the price of crude oil that brought into sharp focus the fuel inefficiency of U.S. automobiles. The report also discusses the previous issues and the most recent developments regarding CAFE.

The BTeV collaboration will record approximately 2 petabytes of raw data per year. It plans to analyze this data using the distributed resources of the collaboration as well as dedicated resources, primarily residing in the very large BTeV trigger farm, and resources accessible through the developing world-wide data grid. The data analysis system is being designed from the very start with this approach in mind. In particular, we plan a fully disk-based data storage system with multiple copies of the data distributed across the collaboration to provide redundancy and to optimize access. We will also position ourself to take maximum advantage of shared systems, as well as dedicated systems, at our collaborating institutions.

We discuss the possible signatures in the electroweak symmetry breaking sector by new strong dynamics at future hadron colliders such as the Tevatron upgrade, the LHC and VLHC, and e{sup +}e{sup -} linear colliders. Examples include a heavy Higgs-like scalar resonance, a heavy Technicolor-like vector resonance and pseudo-Goldstone states, non-resonance signatures via enhanced gauge-boson scattering and fermion compositeness.

The effectiveness of a mixer is dependent on the size of the tank to be mixed, the characteristics of the waste, and the operating conditions. Waste tanks throughout the U.S. Department of Energy Complex require mixing and mobilization systems capable of (1) breaking up and suspending materials that are difficult to mix and pump, without introducing additional liquids into the tank; (2) complementing and augmenting the performance of other remotely operated and/or robotic waste retrieval systems; and (3) operating in tanks with various quantities of waste. The Oak Ridge Russian pulsating mixer pump (PMP) system was designed with the flexibility to permit deployment in a variety of cylindrical tanks. The PMP was installed at the Tanks Technology Cold Test Facility at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) to assess the performance of the system over an extended range of operating conditions, including supply pressures up to 175 psig. Previously conducted cold tests proved the applicability of the PMP for deployment in ORNL gunite tank TH-4. The previous testing and hot demonstrations had been limited to operating at air supply pressures of <100 psig. The extended cold testing of the Russian PMP system showed that the system was capable of mobilizing …

A general methodology was developed for evaluation of carbon sequestration technologies. In this document, we provide a method that is quantitative, but is structured to give qualitative comparisons despite changes in detailed method parameters, i.e., it does not matter what ''grade'' a sequestration technology gets but a ''better'' technology should receive a better grade. To meet these objectives, we developed and elaborate on the following concepts: (1) All resources used in a sequestration activity should be reviewed by estimating the amount of greenhouse gas emissions for which they historically are responsible. We have done this by introducing a quantifier we term Full-Cycle Carbon Emissions, which is tied to the resource. (2) The future fate of sequestered carbon should be included in technology evaluations. We have addressed this by introducing a variable called Time-adjusted Value of Carbon Sequestration to weigh potential future releases of carbon, escaping the sequestered form. (3) The Figure of Merit of a sequestration technology should address the entire life-cycle of an activity. The figures of merit we have developed relate the investment made (carbon release during the construction phase) to the life-time sequestration capacity of the activity. To account for carbon flows that occur during different times …

This report provides the following: an overview of postsecondary education (institutions and students), an overview of the Higher Education Act (HEA) with a focus on its most significant programs and provisions, and a discussion of major issues likely to be of interest to the Congress during the HEA reauthorization process.

This report examines the information analysis function and the sharing information among federal agencies but does not address provisions in the proposed legislation governing the sharing of intelligence with state and local officials; it will be updated as circumstances warrant.

This report discusses the need for cooperation between law enforcement and intelligence agencies and for human intelligence (humint), the use of agents to gather information, to counter terrorism and the risks associated with humint. Updated December 23, 2002.

Recent revolutions in computer hardware and software technologies have paved the way for the large-scale deployment of clusters of commodity computers to address problems heretofore the domain of tightly coupled SMP processors. Near term projects within High Energy Physics and other computing communities will deploy clusters of scale 1000s of processors and be used by 100s to 1000s of independent users. This will expand the reach in both dimensions by an order of magnitude from the current successful production facilities. The goals of this workshop were: (1) to determine what tools exist which can scale up to the cluster sizes foreseen for the next generation of HENP experiments (several thousand nodes) and by implication to identify areas where some investment of money or effort is likely to be needed. (2) To compare and record experimences gained with such tools. (3) To produce a practical guide to all stages of planning, installing, building and operating a large computing cluster in HENP. (4) To identify and connect groups with similar interest within HENP and the larger clustering community.

Since their early application to elliptic partial differential equations, multigrid methods have been applied successfully to a large and growing class of problems, from elasticity and computational fluid dynamics to geodetics and molecular structures. Classical multigrid begins with a two-grid process. First, iterative relaxation is applied, whose effect is to smooth the error. Then a coarse-grid correction is applied, in which the smooth error is determined on a coarser grid. This error is interpolated to the fine grid and used to correct the fine-grid approximation. Applying this method recursively to solve the coarse-grid problem leads to multigrid. The coarse-grid correction works because the residual equation is linear. But this is not the case for nonlinear problems, and different strategies must be employed. In this presentation we describe how to apply multigrid to nonlinear problems. There are two basic approaches. The first is to apply a linearization scheme, such as the Newton's method, and to employ multigrid for the solution of the Jacobian system in each iteration. The second is to apply multigrid directly to the nonlinear problem by employing the so-called Full Approximation Scheme (FAS). In FAS a nonlinear iteration is applied to smooth the error. The full equation is …

We discuss the physics opportunities and detector challenges at future hadron colliders. As guidelines for energies and luminosities we use the proposed luminosity and/or energy upgrade of the LHC (SLHC), and the Fermilab design of a Very Large Hadron Collider (VLHC). We illustrate the physics capabilities of future hadron colliders for a variety of new physics scenarios (supersymmetry, strong electroweak symmetry breaking, new gauge bosons, compositeness and extra dimensions). We also investigate the prospects of doing precision Higgs physics studies at such a machine, and list selected Standard Model physics rates.

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We report on the status and plans of experiments now running or proposed for electron-positron colliders at energies between the {phi} and the Z. The e{sup +}e{sup -}B and charm factories we considered were PEP-II/BABAR, KEKB/Belle, superKEK, SuperBABAR, and CESR-c/CLEO-c. We reviewed the programs at the {phi} factory at Frascati and the proposed PEP-N facility at Stanford Linear Accelerator Center. We studied the prospects for B physics with a dedicated linear collider Z factory, associated with the TESLA high energy linear collider. In all cases, we compared the physics reach of these facilities with that of alternative experiments at hadron colliders or fixed target facilities.

We have examined how a Linear Collider program of 1000 fb{sup -1} could be constructed in the case that a very rich program of new physics is accessible at {radical}s {le} 500 GeV. We have examined possible run plans that would allow the measurement of the parameters of a 120 GeV Higgs boson, the top quark, and could give information on the sparticle masses in SUSY scenarios in which many states are accessible. We find that the construction of the run plan (the specific energies for collider operation, the mix of initial state electron polarization states, and the use of special e{sup -}e{sup -} runs) will depend quite sensitively on the specifics of the supersymmetry model, as the decay channels open to particular sparticles vary drastically and discontinuously as the underlying SUSY model parameters are varied. We have explored this dependence somewhat by considering two rather closely related SUSY model points. We have called for operation at a high energy to study kinematic end points, followed by runs in the vicinity of several two body production thresholds once their location is determined by the end point studies. For our benchmarks, the end point runs are capable of disentangling most sparticle …

Uncertainties in the predicted isotopic concentrations in spent nuclear fuel represent one of the largest sources of overall uncertainty in criticality calculations that use burnup credit. The methods used to propagate the uncertainties in the calculated nuclide concentrations to the uncertainty in the predicted neutron multiplication factor (k{sub eff}) of the system can have a significant effect on the uncertainty in the safety margin in criticality calculations and ultimately affect the potential capacity of spent fuel transport and storage casks employing burnup credit. Methods that can provide a more accurate and realistic estimate of the uncertainty may enable increased spent fuel cask capacity and fewer casks needing to be transported, thereby reducing regulatory burden on licensee while maintaining safety for transporting spent fuel. This report surveys several different best-estimate strategies for considering the effects of nuclide uncertainties in burnup-credit analyses. The potential benefits of these strategies are illustrated for a prototypical burnup-credit cask design. The subcritical margin estimated using best-estimate methods is discussed in comparison to the margin estimated using conventional bounding methods of uncertainty propagation. To quantify the comparison, each of the strategies for estimating uncertainty has been performed using a common database of spent fuel isotopic assay measurements …

In this summary of the considerations of the QCD working group at Snowmass 2001, the roles of quantum chromodynamics in the Standard Model and in the search for new physics are reviewed, with empahsis on frontier areas in the field. We discuss the importance of, and prospects for, precision QCD in perturbative and lattice calculations. We describe new ideas in the analysis of parton distribution functions and jet structure, and review progress in small-x and in polarization experiments.

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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; authority of the Texas Department of Transporation over construction and maintenance of utility lines along a controlled-access highway (RQ-0563-JC)

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 the Euless Economic Development Corporation is "a governmental entity that has the power of eminent domain" under section 272.001(b)(5) of the Local Government Code (RQ-0568-JC)

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; Authority of a district attorney pro tem to modify a standing local government between a district attorney's office and a law enforcement agency regarding the distribution of forfeited funds (RQ-0569-JC)

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 a member of the legislature who resigns his or her legislative office may, during the term for which he or she was elected, be appointed to a position or office that requires senate confirmation. (RQ-05740JC)

Newsletter of the Texas Department of Health discussing the news, activities, and events of the organization and other information related to health in Texas. This issue includes the annual index for 2002.

We present a summary of our experimental understanding of the top quark and discuss the significant improvements expected in Run II at the Fermilab Tevatron Collider. We also discuss prospects for a Higgs boson discovery at the Tevatron.

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Poor oversight and management of DOD's travel card program has led to high delinquency rates, costing DOD millions in lost rebates and increased ATM fees. As a result, the Congress asked GAO to report on (1) the magnitude, impact, and cause of delinquencies, (2) the types of fraudulent and abusive uses of the travel card, and (3) the effectiveness of internal controls over DOD's travel card program. GAO previously reported on travel card management at the Army. This report focuses on travel card management at the Navy, including the Marine Corps."