This report considers the issue of new "fast track" or trade promotion authority (APA) legislation in the 107th Congress. Moreover, the report summarizes the agricultural debates on the issue.

New “fast track” (or, trade promotion) authority (TPA) is at issue in the 107th Congress. Such authority could enable the Administration to submit negotiated foreign trade agreements to Congress for consideration under expedited procedures. Efforts to renew this authority, which expired in 1994, have not succeeded since then. Many agricultural and food industry interests are among the export-oriented enterprises that support TPA, arguing that foreign trading partners will not seriously negotiate with an Administration that lacks it. However, some farm groups argue that fast track ultimately will lead to new agreements that could have adverse effects on U.S. producers, at least in some commodity sectors.

We present a simplified approach for calculating Doppler broadening spectra based purely on atomic calculations. This approach avoids the need for detailed atomic positions, and can provide the characteristic Doppler broadening momentum spectra for any element. We demonstrate the power of this method by comparing theory and experiment for a number of elemental metals and alkali halides. In the alkali halides, the annihilation appears to be entirely with halide electrons.

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A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Defense's (DOD) Logistics Strategic Plan is not comprehensive enough and does not provide an adequate overall logistics strategy to effectively guide the defense components' logistics plans. The military services, the Defense Logistics Agency, and the U.S. Transportation Command each developed separate logistics transformation and other implementation plans to support the Department-wide Logistics Strategic Plan. However, these plans also have weaknesses and are not likely to improve the overall economy, efficiency, and effectiveness of logistics activities."

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n the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), in a September 13, 2001 memorandum to executive branch agencies, identified various hiring flexibilities that can be used to meet staffing needs in emergency situations. This report provides information on each of the flexibilities.

While improving their energy use in buildings and bus fleets, schools are likely to create better places for teaching and learning with better lighting, temperature control, acoustics, and air quality. Smart districts also realize benefits in student performance.

An electromagnetic hybrid scheme (fluid electrons and gyrokinetic ions) is elaborated in example calculations and extended to toroidal geometry. The scheme includes a kinetic electron closure valid for {beta}{sub e} > m{sub e}/m{sub i} ({beta}{sub e} is the ratio of the plasma electron pressure to the magnetic field energy density). The new scheme incorporates partially linearized ({delta}f) drift-kinetic electrons whose pressure and number density moments are used to close the fluid momentum equation for the electron fluid (Ohm's law). The test cases used are small-amplitude kinetic shear-Alfven waves with electron Landau damping, the ion-temperature-gradient instability, and the collisionless drift instability (universal mode) in an unsheared slab as a function of the plasma {beta}{sub e}. Attention is given to resolution and convergence issues in simulations of turbulent steady states.

The strategy used to develop the NIF Integrated Computer Control System (ICCS) calls for incremental cycles of construction and formal test to deliver a total of 1 million lines of code. Each incremental release takes four to six months to implement specific functionality and culminates when offline tests conducted in the ICCS Integration and Test Facility verify functional, performance, and interface requirements. Tests are then repeated on line to confirm integrated operation in dedicated laser laboratories or ultimately in the NIF. Test incidents along with other change requests are recorded and tracked to closure by the software change control board (SCCB). Annual independent audits advise management on software process improvements. Extensive experience has been gained by integrating controls in the prototype laser preamplifier laboratory. The control system installed in the preamplifier lab contains five of the ten planned supervisory subsystems and seven of sixteen planned front-end processors (FEPs). Beam alignment, timing, diagnosis and laser pulse amplification up to 20 joules was tested through an automated series of shots. Other laboratories have provided integrated testing of six additional FEPs. Process measurements including earned-value, product size, and defect densities provide software project controls and generate confidence that the control system will be …

It is commonly assumed that efforts to simultaneously develop energy efficient building technologies and to improve indoor environmental quality (IEQ) are unfeasible. The primary reason for this is that IEQ improvements often require additional ventilation that is costly from an energy standpoint. It is currently thought that health and productivity in work and learning environments requires adequate, if not superior, IEQ. Despite common assumptions, opportunities do exist to design building systems that provide improvements in both energy efficiency and IEQ. This report outlines the selection of a heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) system to be used in demonstrating such an opportunity in a field study using relocatable school classrooms. Standard classrooms use a common wall mounted heat pump HVAC system. After reviewing alternative systems, a wall-mounting indirect/direct evaporative cooling system with an integral hydronic gas heating is selected. The anticipated advantages of this system include continuous ventilation of 100 percent outside air at or above minimum standards, projected cooling energy reductions of about 70 percent, inexpensive gas heating, improved airborne particle filtration, and reduced peak load electricity use. Potential disadvantages include restricted climate regions and possible increases in indoor relative humidity levels under some conditions.

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Information technology (IT) management process controls are predictors of organizational success in developing, acquiring, implementing, operating, and maintaining IT systems and related infrastructure. GAO found that the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) has not implemented practices associated with effective IT investment and enterprise architecture management. Furthermore, these investments are not aligned with an agencywide blueprint that defines the agency's future operational and technological plans. INS does not know whether its ongoing investments are meeting their cost, schedule, and performance commitments."

Work completed in this reporting period focused on the measurement of the rate of ammonia loss from mortar and concrete, and the measurement of ammonia gas in the air above the materials immediately after placement. The majority of mortar experiments have been completed, and testing has begun on concrete. The mortar experiments indicate that the rate of ammonia loss is greater in mortars prepared using a higher water content and water:cement (W:C) ratio, although the higher rate is primarily observed within the first 2 days, after which the loss rates are nearly the same. The source of low-calcium (Class F) fly ash exerted a negligible influence on the loss rate. However, mortar prepared using a higher-calcium fly ash evolved ammonia at a slightly slower rate than the Class F ash mortars. The data also indicate that an increase in ventilation increases the ammonia loss rate from mortar, and suggest that a well-ventilated space could substantially increase the loss of ammonia from mortar and, by inference, a concrete slab. Analysis of ammonia concentrations in the air above freshly-placed mortars in an enclosed space indicate that the fly ash ammonia concentration should not exceed 100 mg N/kg ash in confined space applications. …

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