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DOE OSTI2021

Risk Informed Timelines (RIT) v.1.0

Risk Informed Timelines (RIT) is a more modern and holistic method for understanding how access delay timelines are developed and utilized in physical security system evaluations. The software utilizes Bayesian methods to combine subject matter expert judgement and small performance test datasets in a consistent and defensible way. It allows a more holistic view of delay performance that provides distributions of task times and task success probabilities to account for tasks that, if failed, would result in failure of the attack. The RIT methodology is meant to enable security risk managers to begin the transition into more comprehensive delay timeline analysis. Sandia National Laboratories is a multimission laboratory managed and operated by National Technology & Engineering Solutions of Sandia, LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Honeywell International Inc., for the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration under contract DE-NA0003525. SAND2021-8294 O

Noel, ToddG.↗

DOE OSTI2021

Hybrid Resources: Challenges, Implications, Opportunities, and Innovation

The electric power system has historically been designed to provide reliable energy to loads by using a relatively small number of well-understood generators. The distinction between load, generation, and transmission resources has been quite clear. Most of the responsibility for planning and operating a system - building a highly reliable network from less reliable parts - has been with the system manager, whether that be a utility, a regional market operator, or some similar entity. Given this historical context, many experts were initially perplexed by the rapidly growing popularity of hybrid resources, which combine multiple technologies into a single entity. Rather than depending on a system operator to provide instructions to individual technologies, hybrid resources intentionally take on more operational responsibility by optimizing and scheduling their combined functions. Interconnection queues in many regions reveal a large and growing interest in hybrids, suggesting that project developers and investors see them as providing advantages.

generators↗

DOE OSTI2021

Bio-project “derisking” through development of systematic methodologies and frameworks for risk assessment

One of the primary hindrances to producing a viable, sustainable domestic biomass industry for renewable biofuels, bio-products and bio-power is the lack of understanding and quantification of the risks associated with both the biomass supply chain and preprocessing and conversion technologies. Currently a consistent method for assessing, comparing, and quantifying risks in biomass supply chains does not exist, creating a major investment barrier to bioenergy projects in the U.S. The lack of a standardized approach has resulted in bioenergy stakeholders independently using inconsistent approaches and evaluation criteria, leading to unreliable and incomparable assessments of risks and financing barriers to bio-project development. Along with the challenges of inconsistent risk assessment for supply chain risk, technology specific risks based on variability in biomass properties are not fully understood and can pose significant unforeseen challenges for bioenergy projects. In many cases these properties have not yet been identified and the impacts on the proposed technology and products unquantified. This is particularly challenging for emerging preprocessing and conversion technologies. Without a firm understanding of the preprocessing/conversion technology-specific critical properties, the risk of a proposed bio-project cannot be fully evaluated. To address inconsistent risk evaluation in the biomass supply chain supporting project financing, a Biomass Supply Chain Risk Standards (BSCRS) framework was developed. The BSCRS framework includes a comprehensive list of known and perceived risks (Risk Indicators) to the supply chain developed through 100’s of interviews with bioenergy industry experts spanning from feedstock growers and suppliers to representatives from the financial sector. These risks have been organized into a manageable hierarchy of Risk Categories and Risk Factors that can be practically assessed. This BSCRS framework also provides mitigation strategies for multiple Risk Indicators from best available industry practices and research findings. Additionally, a risk quantification methodology for each Risk Factor, Risk Category, and the bio-project as a whole was developed to enable capital markets to assess feedstock risk more efficiently and more accurately. Multiple case studies representing existing bio-projects have been used to evaluate and verify the BSCRS framework and scoring methodology. To address technological risk along with the supply chain risk captured in the developed BSCRS framework, this work also focuses on development of a systematic criticality assessment tool using well-accepted, quantitative risk analysis methods to evaluate bioenergy feedstock critical properties impacting system unit operations. The proposed Failure Mode and Effect Analysis (FMEA) approach uses a team of subject area experts (SAEs) for each targeted unit operation within a system. Collectively, the team will develop and use a quantitative scoring system to assess the material attributes, process parameters, and quality attributes for key unit operations that have already been identified. The FMEA process generates Risk Priority Numbers (RPNs) for the various failures and predominant causes for each material/process unit/product combination resulting in a semi-quantitative, standardized methodology for assessing technological risk and biomass properties contributing to that risk.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗

DOE OSTI2024

Best Practices Handbook for the Collection and Use of Solar Resource Data for Solar Energy Applications: Fourth Edition

As the world increasingly seeks low-carbon energy solutions, solar power emerges as the most abundant resource on our planet. However, the challenge of effectively harnessing this energy is crucial in the coming years. Solar energy applications such as photovoltaics, solar heating and cooling, and concentrating solar power use different technologies to capitalize on sunlight. Each system has unique capabilities and requirements, underscoring the need for reliable information about solar resources across diverse installations, from residential rooftops to large-scale power plants. This is especially important for substantial projects, often exceeding $1 billion in construction costs. Before embarking on such ventures, it is imperative to obtain accurate data concerning solar resource quality and reliability at specific sites. Developers require detailed historical information, including seasonal, daily, hourly, and, ideally, subhourly variability to effectively predict a power plant's annual performance. Without these vital data, financial analyses fall short. Moreover, with the growing adoption of distributed photovoltaics, integrating these generation sources becomes critical to maintaining grid reliability and stability. By accurately forecasting generation patterns, utilities and system operators can facilitate greater integration of solar energy, thus ensuring the operational stability of the grid. The complexity and importance of these issues have prompted the foremost experts in the field to collaborate under the auspices of the International Energy Agency's (IEA's) Photovoltaic Power Systems Programme (PVPS) Task 16 to publish this handbook, which summarizes state-of-the-art information about all these topics. The efforts focus on providing reliable data and insights that can help shape our investments in solar energy and drive a sustainable future.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗

DOE OSTI2024

Enhancing PV Inverter Reliability Through Predictive Maintenance: Insights from Retrofitting of PV Inverters

Photovoltaic (PV) systems represent a cornerstone in the global shift toward sustainable energy generation, with inverters serving as the crucial link between solar panels and the grid. Despite their pivotal role, inverters are susceptible to failures, contributing significantly to maintenance events and operational disruptions in large-scale PV plants. This white paper investigates the importance and methodologies of predictive maintenance strategies that monitor the component-level pre-failure signatures on PV inverters. Through a comprehensive survey of literature and industry professionals, insights on preventive maintenance and retrofitting practices have been gathered. The expert elicitation helps shed light on common challenges and opportunities for improving PV system reliability, particularly inverter reliability. By addressing these challenges, the white paper aims to enhance the long-term viability and effectiveness of solar PV plants in the renewable energy landscape, contributing to the global transition toward environmentally friendly energy generation.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗

DOE OSTI2023

A ranking methodology for the coupling of pressurized water nuclear reactors and molten salt thermal energy storage

Thermal energy storage (TES) systems are a proposed solution to electricity market demand fluctuations and can be coupled to nuclear power plants to enable load following. Here, this work focuses on developing a methodology for evaluating potential designs for integrating a TES system into an existing pressurized water nuclear power plant. The proposed ranking methodology allows a group of experts to postulate and weigh designs based on ranking criteria derived from literature. The methodology developed in this study can aid in the final selection of a TES design for an existing nuclear power plant. The same process could be used to analyze other TES and nuclear reactor designs. The determined optimum design from this methodology was to place the TES system after the steam generator and to utilize the steam generated from the nuclear power plant to heat a molten salt TES unit. Another conclusion of this research was that human bias is prevalent during design selection, and actions such as standardized ranking criteria and large groups of experts should be used to minimize this error.

25 ENERGY STORAGE↗

DOE OSTI2022

Climate Vulnerability Assessment and Resilience Planning for Idaho National Laboratory

Idaho National Laboratory’s (INL’s) mission is to discover, demonstrate, and secure innovative nuclear energy solutions, other clean energy options, and critical infrastructure. This INL’s Climate Vulnerability Assessment and Resilience Plan (VARP) was developed to enable and sustain that mission while ensuring the viability of operations considering expected climate change impacts. The VARP was developed according to the narrative requirements from the “Vulnerability Assessment and Resilience Planning Guidance, Version 1.2” document issued in February 2022. A prescribed process was used to identify mission-critical systems and components, determine historical and expected climate impacts, and develop resilient solutions. Experts from across INL, including operations staff, researchers, and climate scientists supplied input to the process. Analyses of climate modeling sources revealed that under scenarios of higher and lower greenhouse gas emissions (Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) 4.5 and RCP 8.5), INL anticipates an increase in climate hazards, including drought, heat waves, wildfire, and precipitation. Increased frequency and duration of climatic hazards forecasts high impacts on certain mission-critical asset and infrastructure types. Utilizing the VARP Risk Assessment Tool, projected high climate hazard impacts across multiple asset and infrastructure types at the INL include energy generation and distribution systems, Site buildings, specialized or mission-critical equipment, and transportation and fleet infrastructure. Some of these mission-critical asset and infrastructure types maintain high adaptive capacity to climatic changes; however, others may need additional adaptive capacity to withstand increased frequency and duration of climate hazards. INL identified close to 300 resilient solutions that were consolidated into 11 solution categories to be tracked in the Department of Energy Sustainability Dashboard. The identified solutions are a starting point for future project development and analysis. These data are intended to inform decision makers on climate issues and potential solutions across INL and associated communities. The VARP is not intended to be a budget tool or project decision document on its own, but rather one of many tools used by decision makers to establish resilient priorities. This initial document provides the framework and foundation to resilient solutions. In the coming years, each solution needs to be fully developed, costed, and prioritized based on mission-critical risk and funding priorities.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

DOE OSTI2024

FEW questions, many answers: using machine learning to assess how students connect food–energy–water (FEW) concepts

There is growing support and interest in postsecondary interdisciplinary environmental education which integrate concepts and disciplines in addition to providing varied perspectives. There is a need to assess student learning in these programs as well as rigorous evaluation of educational practices, especially of complex synthesis concepts. This work tests a text classification machine learning model as a tool to assess student systems thinking capabilities using two questions anchored by the Food-Energy-Water (FEW) Nexus phenomena by answering two questions (1) Can machine learning models be used to identify instructor-determined important concepts in student responses? (2) What do college students know about the interconnections between food, energy and water, and how have students assimilated systems thinking into their constructed responses about FEW? Reported here are a broad range of model performances across 26 text classification models associated with two different assessment items, with model accuracy ranging from 0.755 to 0.992. Expert-like responses were infrequent in our dataset compared to responses providing simpler, incomplete explanations of the systems presented in the question. For those students moving from describing individual effects to multiple effects, their reasoning about the mechanism behind the system indicates advanced systems thinking ability. Specifically, students exhibit higher expertise for explaining changing water usage than discussing tradeoffs for such changing usage. This research represents one of the first attempts to assess the links between foundational, discipline-specific concepts and systems thinking ability. These text classification approaches to scoring student FEW Nexus Constructed Responses (CR) indicate how these approaches can be used, in addition to several future research priorities for interdisciplinary, practice-based education research. Development of further complex question items using machine learning would allow evaluation of the relationship between foundational concept understanding and integration of those concepts as well as more nuanced understanding of student comprehension of complex interdisciplinary concepts.

96 KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT AND PRESERVATION↗

DOE OSTI2026

Understanding Fleet Charging Needs [Slides]

Through the U.S. Department of Energy's Energy to Communities (E2C) program, National Laboratory of the Rockies, other national laboratory experts, and select organizations provide Expert Match - free, short-term technical assistance to address near-term energy challenges and questions. Expert Match is for community stakeholders who have decision-making power or influence in their community but need access to additional energy expertise to inform key upcoming decisions. This Expert Match request supported Prince William County, VA with information about fleet charging and telematics.

29 ENERGY PLANNING, POLICY, AND ECONOMY↗

DOE OSTI2023

Inaugural Technologist in Communities Scanning Tour: Automated and Electrified On-Demand Mobility (Follow-On Summary Report: April 24-25, 2023) [Slides]

In 2023, the Technologist in Communities (TIC) program hosted its inaugural scanning tour across the American Southwest, with a goal of investigating the region's leading public mobility systems and their integration with on-demand public mobility services. The scanning tour concept was inspired by and named after a U.S. Department of Transportation Federal Highway Administration practice of hosting "scanning tours," both domestically and abroad, to explore innovative transportation practices throughout the 1990s and early 2000s. Guided by the idea that "seeing is believing," scanning tours created opportunities for government and industry representatives to collectively experience new technologies and best practices firsthand. In 2023, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) followed suit by leading the inaugural TIC scanning tour. TIC, part of the Technology Integration program within the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE's) Vehicle Technologies Office, supports positive energy and mobility outcomes in communities across rural to urban contexts. TIC enables technical experts to work directly with leaders and stakeholders in communities and assist them in implementing promising new technologies. This first TIC scanning tour invited NREL, DOE, and industry experts to survey innovative public mobility practices and their integration into public transit systems across the Southwest. The tour's goals included examining the state of innovation in public mobility in cities, communities, and airports; facilitating collaboration between entities; and sparking potential new partnerships. The following report summarizes key findings from the scanning tour.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗

DOE OSTI2020

A terminology for in situ visualization and analysis systems

The term "in situ processing" has evolved over the last decade to mean both a specific strategy for visualizing and analyzing data and an umbrella term for a processing paradigm. The resulting confusion makes it difficult for visualization and analysis scientists to communicate with each other and with their stakeholders. To address this problem, a group of over 50 experts convened with the goal of standardizing terminology. This paper summarizes their findings and proposes a new terminology for describing in situ systems. An important finding from this group was that in situ systems are best described via multiple, distinct axes: integration type, proximity, access, division of execution, operation controls, and output type. This paper discusses these axes, evaluates existing systems within the axes, and explores how currently used terms relate to the axes.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

DOE OSTI2020

Parameter-dependent model-blending with multi-expert based machine learning and proxy sites

A parameter-based multi-model blending method and system are described. The method includes selecting a parameter of interest among parameters estimated by each of a set of individual models, running the set of individual models with a range of inputs to obtain a range of estimates of the parameters from each of the set of individual models, and identifying, for each of the set of individual models, critical parameters among the parameters estimated, the critical parameters exhibiting a specified correlation with an error in estimation of the parameter of interest. For each subspace of combinations of the critical parameters, obtaining a parameter-based blended model is based on blending the set of individual models in accordance with the subspace of the critical parameters, the subspace defining a sub-range for each of the critical parameters.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

DOE OSTI2020

Parameter-dependent model-blending with multi-expert based machine learning and proxy sites

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

DOE OSTI2020

Parameter-dependent model-blending with multi-expert based machine learning and proxy sites

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

DOE OSTI2020

2019 Anion Exchange Membrane Workshop Summary Report

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory, in coordination with the U.S. Department of Energy Fuel Cell Technologies Office, Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy, and Los Alamos National Laboratory, hosted the 2019 Anion Exchange Membrane Workshop at the Sheraton Dallas Hotel in Dallas, Texas, on May 30, 2019. More than 50 industrial, academic, national laboratory, and government experts representing the needs of anion exchange membranes, membrane electrode assemblies, and system and stack components attended the workshop.

30 DIRECT ENERGY CONVERSION↗

DOE OSTI2021

Best Practices Handbook for the Collection and Use of Solar Resource Data for Solar Energy Applications: Third Edition

As the world looks for low-carbon sources of energy, solar power stands out as the single most abundant energy resource on Earth. Harnessing this energy is the challenge for this century. Photovoltaics, solar heating and cooling, and concentrating solar power (CSP) are primary forms of energy applications using sunlight. These solar energy systems use different technologies, collect different fractions of the solar resource, and have different siting requirements and production capabilities. Reliable information about the solar resource is required for every solar energy application. This holds true for small installations on a rooftop as well as for large solar power plants; however, solar resource information is of particular interest for large installations because they require substantial investment, sometimes exceeding 1 billion dollars in construction costs. Before such a project is undertaken, the best possible information about the quality and reliability of the fuel source must be made available. That is, project developers need reliable data about the solar resource available at specific locations, including historic trends with seasonal, daily, hourly, and (preferably) subhourly variability to predict the daily and annual performance of a proposed power plant. Without these data, an accurate financial analysis is not possible. Additionally, with the deployment of large amounts of distributed photovoltaics, there is an urgent need to integrate this source of generation to ensure the reliability and stability of the grid. Forecasting generation from the various sources will allow for larger penetrations of these generation sources because utilities and system operators can then ensure stable grid operations. Developed by the foremost experts in the field who have come together under the umbrella of the International Energy Agency’s Solar Heating and Cooling Task 46, this handbook summarizes state-of-the-art information about all these topics.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗

DOE OSTI2024

Project Report for Cold Spray Phase 2 (Tasks 9-20)

In support of the ongoing environmental protection mission at the Hanford Site, led by Washington River Protection Solutions (WRPS), the cold spray team has continued development of the tank refurbishment technology. Orano Federal Services, along with subcontractors VRC Metal Systems (VRC) and Robotic Technologies of Tennessee (RTT), have worked with WRPS experts to refine the tools demonstrated in Phase 1 of this project, with the potential to refurbish double shell tanks (DST)s on the Hanford Site, extending the service lives of these vital waste storage facilities.

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE W↗

DOE OSTI2022

Project Report for Cold Spray: Phase 2

In support of the ongoing environmental protection mission at the Hanford Site, led by Washington River Protection Services (WRPS), the cold spray team has continued development of the tank refurbishment technology. Orano Federal Services, along with subcontractors VRC Metal Systems (VRC) and Robotic Technologies of Tennessee (RTT), have worked with WRPS experts to refine the tools demonstrated in Phase 1 of this project, with the potential to refurbish double shell tanks (DST)s on the Hanford Site, extending the service lives of these vital waste storage facilities.

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE W↗