SEARCH · Engineering Papers
Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.
Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.
This report describes a cost-benefit analysis of approaches for debris remediation, which is defined as any action taken to reduce the risks posed by orbital debris by moving, removing, or reusing it. A better understanding of the near-term costs and benefits of the different approaches to remediation can support decision-making about R&D investment and policy creation in this area.
These slides provide a high-level summary of a cost-benefit analysis of approaches for debris remediation, which is defined as any action taken to reduce the risks posed by orbital debris by moving, removing, or reusing it. A better understanding of the near-term costs and benefits of the different approaches to remediation can support decision-making about R&D investment and policy creation in this area.
—This paper describes the use of the Consultative Committee for Space Data Systems (CCSDS) File Delivery Protocol (CFDP) on the Europa Clipper mission for both uplink and downlink of files. It includes an overview of CFDP, the history of why CFDP was chosen, how it benefits mission operations, some of the mission scenarios that stress CFDP, operability aspects, the best practices that Clipper adopted from other missions and some of the technical challenges with implementation, and verification and validation. The benefits to mission operations accrue because CFDP reduces the need for manual management of file transfer, including retransmission of missing data, and deletion of files only after confirmation of receipt by the ground. The challenges occur because CFDP is a round-trip protocol – it requires messages in both directions to complete a file transfer, and because it uses timers to ensure that control messages are resent if needed to prevent transactions from going stale. Any situations where communication is restricted to a single direction, interrupted, reordered, or backlogged can pose a challenge. There are also implementation challenges. Europa Clipper is the first mission at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) to adopt class 2, fully acknowledged, CFDP for both uplink and downlink. The implementation needed new software, requirements and operational procedures. The experience of the Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) with CFDP from their previous missions was crucial to success for Europa Clipper. Because CFDP relies on timers and messages travel in both directions, verification and validation (V&V) requires new approaches. For certain scenarios, a live ground system talking to a live flight system with realistic simulated one-way light times, data rates and data outages must be used.
Early stages of life likely employed catalytic RNAs (ribozymes) in many functions that are today filled by proteins. However, the earliest life forms must have emerged from heterogenous chemical mixtures, which included amino acids, short peptides, and many other compounds. Here we explored whether the presence of short peptides can help the emergence of catalytic RNAs. To do this, we conducted an in vitro selection for catalytic RNAs from randomized sequence in the presence of ten different peptides with a prebiotically plausible length of eight amino acids. This in vitro selection generated dozens of ribozymes, one of them with ∼900-fold higher activity in the presence of one specific peptide. Unexpectedly, the beneficial peptide had retained its N-terminal Fmoc protection group, and this group was required to benefit ribozyme activity. The same, or higher benefit resulted from peptide conjugates with prebiotically plausible polyaromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) such as fluorene and naphthalene. This shows that PAH-peptide conjugates can act as potent cofactors to enhance ribozyme activity. The results are discussed in the context of the origin of life.
This study aims to demonstrate the benefits of using novel high spatiotemporal retrieval products from newer satellites for top-down emission estimates of nitrogen oxides (NO x ) and non-methane volatile organic compounds (NMVOCs) for the summer of 2019 over the contiguous United States. Recent satellite retrievals have not only advanced spatiotemporal resolution but also greatly reduced error and uncertainty due to reduced noise in the retrievals compared to spaceborne sensors launched in the past. We applied inverse modeling techniques using tropospheric nitrogen dioxide (NO 2 ) and formaldehyde (H-CHO) column retrieval products from the Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) and TROPOspheric Monitoring Instrument (TROPOMI) in conjunction with the Weather Research Forecast and Community Multiscale Air Quality Modeling system (WRF-CMAQ). In order to provide a better representation of background chemical composition and avoid misalignment of emission adjustment, we applied monthly scaling factors for ozone (O 3 ) and CO boundary concentrations in addition to the inclusion of lightning and aviation emissions. Satellite-constrained NO x and NMVOCs posterior emissions showed a mitigated discrepancy between observed and modeled columns. The improvement in the model performance was greater when using TROPOMI, primarily benefiting from reduced errors/biases of the satellite retrievals that enabled us to explore corresponding changes in O 3 concentrations and production sensitivity regimes using the ratio of H-CHO and NO 2 .
Orbital debris may collide with crewed and robotic spacecraft, placing them at risk. The wide range of debris, from 9,000-kilogram rocket bodies to millions of millimeter-size debris, has led to a similarly wide range of proposed actions for addressing the risks posed by debris. However, the costs and benefits of these actions have historically been unknown. This is a challenge for decision makers who are choosing which actions to support through technology development or policy changes. NASA’s Office of Technology, Policy, and Strategy is addressing these technical and economic uncertainties by building a capability to (1) complete rigorous calculations of the net present value of each action, (2) identify an optimal portfolio of actions to reduce risk, and (3) quantitatively analyze policies related to space sustainability. This report describes our progress toward that capability and to solicit feedback from the space and economic communities. Our previous work, referred to here as Phase 1, assessed the costs and benefits of performing debris remediation on operationally relevant timescales. The current analysis contains major updates to the risk model used in Phase 1 and expands the breadth of actions considered to include mitigating the creation of debris, improving the ability to track debris, and more methods for cleaning up existing debris. We demonstrate that our approach of measuring risks in dollars allows for the effectiveness of seemingly incommensurate actions to be compared and generates insights that other approaches to measuring risk have missed.
Presentation accompanying the technical report with the same name. The abstract for the report and the full study is repeated below. Orbital debris may collide with crewed and robotic spacecraft, placing them at risk. The wide range of debris, from 9,000-kilogram rocket bodies to millions of millimeter-size debris, has led to a similarly wide range of proposed actions for addressing the risks posed by debris. However, the costs and benefits of these actions have historically been unknown. This is a challenge for decision makers who are choosing which actions to support through technology development or policy changes. NASA’s Office of Technology, Policy, and Strategy is addressing these technical and economic uncertainties by building a capability to (1) complete rigorous calculations of the net present value of each action, (2) identify an optimal portfolio of actions to reduce risk, and (3) quantitatively analyze policies related to space sustainability. This report describes our progress toward that capability and to solicit feedback from the space and economic communities. Our previous work, referred to here as Phase 1, assessed the costs and benefits of performing debris remediation on operationally relevant timescales. The current analysis contains major updates to the risk model used in Phase 1 and expands the breadth of actions considered to include mitigating the creation of debris, improving the ability to track debris, and more methods for cleaning up existing debris. We demonstrate that our approach of measuring risks in dollars allows for the effectiveness of seemingly incommensurate actions to be compared and generates insights that other approaches to measuring risk have missed.
Summary: We summarize findings related to assessing the pick-and-eat salad-crop productivity and acceptability of the ISS food system as a countermeasure to maintain behavioral health in long-duration spaceflight. BACKGROUND Plants are a potential countermeasure for the stresses of living in space. Caring for plants and eating fresh food have been shown to serve as a psychological benefit for previous astronauts and for others in analogous environments such as Antarctica [1,2]. Gardening can be therapeutic in terrestrial settings [3]. These effects may carry over or be more pronounced in austere environments such as spaceflight. It can reduce stress and increase sensory stimulation and enjoyment [2]. Growing crops may offer astronauts meaningful and engaging work as they care for living things in an austere environment away from Earth’s nature and as they provide sustenance for their crew. We examined the extent to which interacting with plants (e.g., tending to, consuming) was related to behavioral health outcomes in long-duration space missions. METHOD Participants were 27 astronauts that interacted with the plant system VEG-04, VEG-05, and HRF-VEG (VEG-03 I-L, PH-04). In total, there were 106 in-flight observations. Participants completed monthly measures of mood and well-being, enjoyment and time spent performing specific crop growth and consuming the plants, meaningfulness, performance, connections with others and the Earth, desire to work with and eat plants, and experiences with struggling or dying plants. Higher ends of the 7-point Likert scale indicated more positive outcomes, lower ends of the scale were anchored with more negative outcomes, and the scale midpoints indicated neutral positions. Participants selected a specific survey version based on whether they interacted with the plant system(s) or not, and we included only the scores from the crewmembers that participated in any given activity. RESULTS & DISCUSSION Results indicated that participants generally rated tasks related to the plants and crop growth as enjoyable. Consuming the harvested plants and voluntary viewing were the most enjoyable activities. Tending to the plants was reported as moderately enjoyable, indicating BHP benefits from this work task. The BHP impacts of whether the task was engaging, meaningful, supported well-being, or was demanding for a crewmember were generally positive and increased over time. As shown in the Figure, working with plants was reported as more engaging, meaningful, and beneficial to well-being over time, while the demand from the task was moderate to low and consistent over time. Engaging, meaningful, and supporting well-being were strongly, positively correlated with each other, which is consistent with research that suggests engaging and meaningful work can support well-being. Plant activities such as voluntary viewing, watering, harvesting, and consuming, were positively related to task engagement and meaning, and enjoyment and well-being. Findings suggest that working with plants and consuming them can be a behavioral health countermeasure for long-duration spaceflight. REFERENCES [1] Schlacht I, et al. (2020) Impact of plants in isolation: The EDEN-ISS…in Antarctica. In Advances in Human Factors of Transportation, Washington DC. [2] Vessel E, Russo S (2015) Effects of reduced sensory stimulation and…countermeasures…. NASA/TM-2015-218576. [3] Odeh R, Guy C (2017) Gardening for therapeutic people-plant interactions during LDSM. Open Agriculture, 2(1), 1-13. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This research was supported by the Human Health and Performance Contract NNJ15HK11B, and NASA grant MTL #1075 (PI G.D. Massa).
Summary: We summarize findings related to assessing the pick-and-eat salad-crop productivity and acceptability of the ISS food system as a countermeasure to maintain behavioral health in long-duration spaceflight. BACKGROUND Plants are a potential countermeasure for the stresses of living in space. Caring for plants and eating fresh food have been shown to serve as a psychological benefit for previous astronauts and for others in analogous environments such as Antarctica [1,2]. Gardening can be therapeutic in terrestrial settings [3]. These effects may carry over or be more pronounced in austere environments such as spaceflight. It can reduce stress and increase sensory stimulation and enjoyment [2]. Growing crops may offer astronauts meaningful and engaging work as they care for living things in an austere environment away from Earth’s nature and as they provide sustenance for their crew. We examined the extent to which interacting with plants (e.g., tending to, consuming) was related to behavioral health outcomes in long-duration space missions. METHOD Participants were 27 astronauts that interacted with the plant system VEG-04, VEG-05, and HRF-VEG (VEG-03 I-L, PH-04). In total, there were 106 in-flight observations. Participants completed monthly measures of mood and well-being, enjoyment and time spent performing specific crop growth and consuming the plants, meaningfulness, performance, connections with others and the Earth, desire to work with and eat plants, and experiences with struggling or dying plants. Higher ends of the 7-point Likert scale indicated more positive outcomes, lower ends of the scale were anchored with more negative outcomes, and the scale midpoints indicated neutral positions. Participants selected a specific survey version based on whether they interacted with the plant system(s) or not, and we included only the scores from the crewmembers that participated in any given activity. RESULTS & DISCUSSION Results indicated that participants generally rated tasks related to the plants and crop growth as enjoyable. Consuming the harvested plants and voluntary viewing were the most enjoyable activities. Tending to the plants was reported as moderately enjoyable, indicating BHP benefits from this work task. The BHP impacts of whether the task was engaging, meaningful, supported well-being, or was demanding for a crewmember were generally positive and increased over time. As shown in the Figure, working with plants was reported as more engaging, meaningful, and beneficial to well-being over time, while the demand from the task was moderate to low and consistent over time. Engaging, meaningful, and supporting well-being were strongly, positively correlated with each other, which is consistent with research that suggests engaging and meaningful work can support well-being. Plant activities such as voluntary viewing, watering, harvesting, and consuming, were positively related to task engagement and meaning, and enjoyment and well-being. Findings suggest that working with plants and consuming them can be a behavioral health countermeasure for long-duration spaceflight. REFERENCES [1] Schlacht I, et al. (2020) Impact of plants in isolation: The EDEN-ISS…in Antarctica. In Advances in Human Factors of Transportation, Washington DC. [2] Vessel E, Russo S (2015) Effects of reduced sensory stimulation and…countermeasures…. NASA/TM-2015-218576. [3] Odeh R, Guy C (2017) Gardening for therapeutic people-plant interactions during LDSM. Open Agriculture, 2(1), 1-13. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This research was supported by the Human Health and Performance Contract NNJ15HK11B, and NASA grant MTL #1075 (PI G.D. Massa).
Distributed energy resources are increasingly used in power distribution systems and microgrids to supply cost competitive power, improve resilience, and provide a host of grid services. Diversifying variable renewable resources (e.g., by combining wind with solar) can increase energy usage efficiency and improve system resilience. However, when grid optimization and resilience studies consider multiple renewable resources, diversity benefits are usually captured only implicitly in the results of location-specific economic optimization. In this paper, metrics are introduced to express the technical value of resource diversity independent of jurisdiction-specific market structures. Specifically, marginal energy usage efficiency metrics are developed to quantify the ability of new distributed generation to produce useful energy and an incremental sustainable ride through metric is developed to express improvement in grid outage ride through capability. While there are economic implications for each of these metrics, the metrics themselves are technically-driven and could be used as components of a technical figure of merit that could be used to inform policy actions, such as development of resource-specific incentives and time-of-use tariff designs. Each of these metrics is demonstrated using balance-of-energy simulations that highlight the benefits of improving resource diversity.
Community and city leaders are interested in achieving sustainability goals, providing resilient energy infrastructure, and improving economic competitiveness. Community-level data acquisition and analysis can provide energy and associated benefits that are not possible at the single building level. However, there is a lack of organizational structure, common semantic data models, interoperable systems, and methods to support data-driven decision-making for community-scale energy supply and demand systems. We explored the need and opportunity for a Community Energy Operations and Planning System (Community EOPS), a potential data exchange platform. We conducted “customer discovery” interviews, and reviewed literature, public tools, and technology platforms to identify key energy data “users” and use cases in communities. The key users of the Community EOPS could be developers of mixed-use districts, corporate, defense and university campus energy managers, and city managers of cities that own their energy utility. The value could be for community planning and reporting (for energy data-integrated land use planning and community infrastructure investments in microgrids, storage, district heating and cooling), energy efficiency (leveraging optimizations for community scale energy supply and demand), flexible load management (grid-edge load management to offset, shift, and flatten loads for multiple buildings and EV fleets), cost savings and revenue generation (participating in grid services), and social benefits such as energy resilience, equity, and awareness. We developed a conceptual Community EOPS architecture with recommendations for streamlined and prioritized data acquisition, sharing, and integration driven by prioritized use cases, common metrics, and actionable visualizations that can provide value to a community’s users.
Like many organizations and groups, the Department of Energy Environmental Management program and the nuclear industry are facing an aging employee population and record numbers of employee retirements. This 'silver tsunami' of retirees means the industry as a whole is recruiting graduates at a fast pace. So, how do we ensure the nuclear industry has a robust pipeline of graduates with the necessary background? Fluor Idaho's investment in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education programs helps promote the next generation of technical professionals, benefiting both the company and the industry. Through community outreach initiatives and student mentoring programs, Fluor Idaho promotes kids' interest in STEM. The programs are designed to spark STEM interest in grade school and then foster and grow that interest through high school and higher education. After igniting student excitement about STEM topics in school, Fluor Idaho focuses on providing work-specific opportunities including mentoring and intern programs. These programs give students a better look at real-world job opportunities while still stimulating their interest in STEM. These programs ultimately provide career opportunities for the students and a pipeline of workers. Fluor Idaho's strategy for its summer interns has been to place students in a wide variety of projects - from the commissioning of a first-of-a-kind nuclear processing facility, to operating nuclear waste management facilities, to developing computer programs and applications - and give them responsibilities that make them feel like valued contributors. This approach has created a positive and rewarding summer-intern program experience for the students. Fluor Idaho's investment in its future today is reducing the knowledge gap - or cliff - that many contractors in the nuclear industry are facing. It's a worthwhile investment that is readily visible within its many cleanup projects. The next generation of technical professionals is making an impact now - benefiting both the company and the nuclear industry. This paper will review Fluor Idaho's programs, including STEM community outreach and education and mentoring programs. It will also present statistics about the reach of those programs and their successes. (authors)
A brief overview of the benefits of energy storage presented as a factsheet for a community audience. Benefits include: access, resilience, social impact, affordability, and emissions reduction.
Carbon policies differentiated according to regional disparities have been recognized and recommended. However, the air quality co-benefits of differentiated policies remain unclear. Here we combine a multi-regional dynamic computable general equilibrium (CGE) model and an extend response surface model (ERSM) to investigate the impact of nationally uniform and subnationally differentiated carbon pricing policies on fine particulate matter (PM 2.5 ) concentrations in China. All policies examined lead to the same accumulated national CO 2 emissions (2020–2050), with the 2030 emissions attaining China's national abatement target. We find that, when subnational policies differentiated according to provincial PM 2.5 concentrations are implemented, the higher-than-average carbon price over more polluted provinces results in twice as much reduction in CO 2 and air pollutant emissions in 2050 as the national policy. As a result, the subnational policies cause larger PM 2.5 concentration reductions in these provinces (9%–18%) than the national policy (7%–11%). Also, the subnational policies eliminate high PM 2.5 exposure of over 45 μg/m 3 which 12% people suffer from under the national policy. Overall, the subnational policies substantially reduce regional disparity in PM 2.5 pollution and hence improve environmental equity. The results suggest that subnationally differentiated carbon policies are a promising instrument to mitigate severe pollution and promote environmental equity.
This dataset contains BEPAM model code and input data to replicate the outcomes for "The Economic and Environmental Costs and Benefits of the Renewable Fuel Standard". The dataset consists of: (1) The replication codes and data for the BEPAM model. The code file is named as output.gms. (BEPAM-Social cost model-ERL.zip) (2) Simulation results from the BEPAM model (BEPAM_Simulation_Results.csv) * Item (1) is in GAMS format. Item (2) is in text format.
As an energy storage technology, pumped storage hydropower (PSH) supports various aspects of power system operations. However, determining the value of PSH plants and their many services and contributions to the system has been a challenge. While there is a general understanding that PSH resources provide many services and benefits for the operation of power systems, estimating the value of these services—and especially the monetary value of some of those services—has been a challenge. The objective of this project, funded by the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Water Power Technologies Office (WPTO), is to advance the state of the art in assessing the value of PSH plants and their contributions to the power system. The specific goal is to develop detailed, step-by-step valuation guidance that PSH developers, plant owners or operators, and other stakeholders can use to assess the value of existing or potential new PSH plants and their services. The specific goals of this project are: (1) to develop comprehensive and transparent valuation guidance that will support consistent valuation assessments and comparisons of PSH projects or project design alternatives, (2) to test the PSH valuation guidance and its underlying methodology by applying it to two selected PSH projects, and (3) to transfer and disseminate the PSH valuation guidance to the hydropower industry, PSH developers, and other stakeholders. The authors believe that the application of a consistent, transparent, and repeatable valuation process will advance valuation assessments and allow stakeholders to compare valuation analyses performed for different PSH projects or design alternatives. It will also increase the acceptance of valuation results and enable better understanding of the true value that PSH technology brings to the grid.
The increasing deployment of distributed solar photovoltaics (DPV) to meet clean energy goals can trigger adverse grid operation issues, such as voltage excursions and the violation of thermal loading constraints of the power delivery elements (e.g., lines and transformers) on the evolving electricity infrastructure. Such integration issues would require distribution upgrades with associated costs to mitigate them and to maintain reliable and resilient grid operating conditions. Traditional distribution network upgrade approaches use a specific single snapshot analysis that is overly conservative. This study considers a multi-time point analysis to capture both moderate (probable bounds) and extreme grid operating conditions using time points such as minimum load with minimum photovoltaics (PV), maximum load with maximum PV, maximum load with minimum PV, and minimum load with maximum PV. Further, this study investigates seasonal variation impacts and associated distribution upgrade costs for a spring season case (March, representing a low load and high PV scenario) and a summer case (July, representing a high load and high PV scenario). Such seasonal analysis will allow system operators to characterize upgrade requirements and associated costs across various periods. Because the spatial distribution of DPV can impact upgrade and associated costs, this study investigates three common DPV deployment scenarios - randomly deployed, close to the substation, and far from the substation - at different penetration levels. Apart from spatial distribution impacts, this project evaluates the techno-economic impacts of the nodal photovoltaic penetration factor (NPPF) for generating the various DPV deployment scenarios at increasing penetration levels. This project investigates the impact of varying nodal PV-to-load ratios using conservative and extreme NPPF values of 3 and 10, respectively. This study investigates the deployment of traditional infrastructure upgrade strategies, such as installing new voltage regulating equipment, transformers and lines replacements, and the activation of advanced inverter functionality (e.g., autonomous volt/VAR) in expanding PV hosting capacity. Existing DPV systems are assumed to operate with the legacy unity power factor, and we considered the possibility of retrofitting such systems with the activation of volt/VAR control as integration standards and regulations continue to evolve to allow such functions. The cost-benefit analysis metrics used in study include distribution upgrade costs, average cost per watt of the upgrade cost, average marginal cost per watt of the upgrade cost, and power losses.
This document provides community benefits plans guidance for state energy programs. It includes best practices, step-by-step guidance, and tips for writing a project overview as well as developing the four required components of a CBP: Engaging Communities and Labor, Investing in America's Workforce, DEIA, and Justice40. It also explains various types of agreements that fall under the CBP umbrella, including community workforce agreements and project labor agreements. The intended audience is both applicants and reviewers.