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At least 685 records · Page 38

Developing Uintah's Runtime System for Forthcoming Architectures

The need to solve ever-more complex science and engineering problems on computer architectures that are rapidly evolving poses considerable challenges for modern simulation frameworks and packages. While the decomposition of software into a programming model that generates a task-graph for execution by a runtime system make portability and performance possible, it also imposes considerable demands on that runtime system. Here, the challenge of meeting those demands for near-term and longer term systems in the context of the Uintah framework is considered in key areas such as support for data structures, tasks on heterogeneous architectures, performance portability, power management and designing for resilience by the use of replication based upon adaptive mesh refinement processes is addressed. Examples of techniques in these areas are used to illustrate performance improvements obtained for present large-scale systems and the needs of proposed systems considered.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

The Environmental Protection Agency's Safety Standards for Disposal of Spent Nuclear Fuel: Potential Path Forward in Response to the Report of the Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future - 13388

Following the decision to withdraw the Yucca Mountain license application, the Department of Energy created a Blue Ribbon Commission (BRC) on America's Nuclear Future, tasked with recommending a national strategy to manage the back end of the nuclear fuel cycle. The BRC issued its final report in January 2012, with recommendations covering transportation, storage and disposal of spent nuclear fuel (SNF); potential reprocessing; and supporting institutional measures. The BRC recommendations on disposal of SNF and high-level waste (HLW) are relevant to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which shares regulatory responsibility with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC): EPA issues 'generally applicable' performance standards for disposal repositories, which are then implemented in licensing. For disposal, the BRC endorses developing one or more geological repositories, with siting based on an approach that is adaptive, staged and consent-based. The BRC recommends that EPA and NRC work cooperatively to issue generic disposal standards-applying equally to all sites-early in any siting process. EPA previously issued generic disposal standards that apply to all sites other than Yucca Mountain. However, the BRC concluded that the existing regulations should be revisited and revised. The BRC proposes a number of general principles to guide the development of future regulations. EPA continues to review the BRC report and to assess the implications for Agency action, including potential regulatory issues and considerations if EPA develops new or revised generic disposal standards. This review also involves preparatory activities to define potential process and public engagement approaches. (authors)

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Effects of adaptive automation on operator-system performance - 103

Adaptive automation (AA) is the dynamic, real-time change in the degree of automation in response to situational changes. AA systems are being developed in many industries, including for nuclear power plant applications. AA is a promising means of mitigating human performance issues that often arise in highly automated systems. The purpose of this Nuclear Regulatory Commission study was to characterize important AA design features, define the effects of AA on performance, examine the human factors engineering (HFE) guidance available to design and evaluate AA systems, and identify research and development needs. In general, we found that AA improves task performance and situation awareness (SA) while managing workload. Although the research is limited, AA also supports operator recognition of automation failure and recovery. Research on human-system interfaces has identified principles showing promise for supporting SA, including failure detection, and limiting workload. Research further suggests that AA systems are both more effective, and less disruptive and distracting, when they follow rules of interaction similar to those used by human crewmembers. Our general conclusion about the HFE guidance available to designers and reviewers is that it is limited and has not kept pace with automation technology. We discuss several research and development needs that will help support a better understanding of where and how AA should be used and support the development of more comprehensive guidance for AA safety reviews. (authors)

22 GENERAL STUDIES OF NUCLEAR REACTORS↗

Active Causal Machine Learning for Molecular Property Prediction

Predicting properties from molecular structures is paramount to design tasks in medicine, materials science, and environmental management. However, design rules derived from the structure-property relationships using correlative data-driven methods fail to elucidate underlying causal mechanisms controlling chemical phenomena. This preliminary work proposes a workflow to actively learn robust cause-effect relations between structural features and molecular property for a broad chemical space utilizing smaller subsets, entailing partial information.

Fox, Zach↗

Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands Energy Action Plan

This document describes the three near-term energy strategies selected by the CNMI Energy Task Force during action planning workshops conducted in March 2013, and outlines the steps being taken to implement those strategies. The three energy strategies selected by the task force are (1) designing a demand-side management program focusing on utility, residential and commercial sectors, (2) developing an outreach and education plan focused on energy conservation in government agencies and businesses, including workplace rules, and (3) exploring waste-to-energy options. The task force also discussed several other medium- and long-term energy strategies that could be explored at a future date.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗

AgRISTARS: Renewable resources inventory. Land information support system implementation plan and schedule

The planning and scheduling of the use of remote sensing and computer technology to support the land management planning effort at the national forests level are outlined. The task planning and system capability development were reviewed. A user evaluation is presented along with technological transfer methodology. A land management planning pilot test of the San Juan National Forest is discussed.

Yao, S. S.↗

Managing the interfaces for successful waste treatment operations at the river protection project - 15347

The Department of Energy (DOE) is constructing the Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant (WTP) at the Hanford site in Washington to treat and immobilize(vitrify) approximately 432 million liters (114 million gallons) of high level radioactive waste (after all single-shell retrievals are accomplished). The tank operating contractor (TOC) is charged with delivering feed, with preconditioning if required. Other Hanford contractors are charged with providing utilities and other services and waste disposal facilities. In all, four DOE contractors, two DOE offices along with DOE headquarters, and two Washington state regulators play essential roles in enabling successful treatment operations eliminate the radioactive and hazardous waste threats to the public and the environment. DOE has decided that the appropriate approach is to proceed with operations at the WTP's Low-Activity Waste (LAW) vitrification facility ahead of completing the WTP Pretreatment and High Level Waste (HLW) waste vitrification facilities, This paper outlines the approach that is being taken to ensure that all the functions, reviews, and approvals needed for radioactive operations are achieved to allow successful feed delivery, startup, and operations of the WTP in a direct feed to LAW mode. A massive effort is needed to be successful and a One System organization, jointly managed and staffed by WTP and TOC personnel is tasked with achieving the integration, coordination, tracking, and reporting necessary for the endeavor. (authors)

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Conductor Properties and Coil Technology for a Bi2212 Dipole Insert for 20 Tesla Hybrid Accelerator Magnets

A dipole insert based on a 2-layer cos-theta coil with stress management and Bi2212 superconducting strand and cable is being developed at Fermilab as part of the US-MDP effort. The ultimate goal of this task is to develop coil technology and an approach to manage azimuthal and radial strains of high temperature superconductor inserts when integrated within Nb3Sn outserts as a hybrid magnet system. This note reviews conductor properties and possible coil technologies.

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS↗

Integrating Commercial Ready Autonomous Robotic Platforms to Enhance Worker Safety and Efficiency - 20053

This paper will explore the challenges and triumphs of implementing advanced robotic systems and the supporting technology for the waste management industry. Deployment-ready solutions for autonomous robotic platforms are new to the radioactive waste management industry and have been slow to implement across the complex. Specifically, it will explore Hanford Tank Operations Contractor's implementation of ground-based autonomous robotic platforms to enhance workforce safety and efficiency. The first objective of the project is to demonstrate safe operation of autonomous instrumented robots, followed by a scaling up of capabilities for the platform to meet any additional requests of internal stakeholders. Autonomous robotics platforms offer a fantastic range of capabilities that will aid in decreasing long-term liability of radioactive waste management industry by enhancing clean-up efforts and worker safety. Over the past five years, deployment-ready solutions for autonomous robotic platforms have come a long way. Autonomous robotic platforms are increasingly available to purchase from many vendors, often for prices under $100,000. Additionally, the vendors who produce these products are efficient in accommodating customized solutions to unique challenges, such as those often found in the radioactive waste management industry. However, the newness of this technology to the radioactive waste management industry and has resulted in a slow implementation across the complex. This paper will explore the challenges and triumphs of implementing advanced robotic systems and supporting technology for the waste management industry. Specifically, it will explore Hanford Tank Operations Contractor's implementation of ground based autonomous robotic platforms to enhance workforce safety and efficiency. While the company has utilized robots in many parts of the tank farms mission, this was first attempted in the deployment of an autonomous platform that required no operator with only minor maintenance and created challenges not yet encountered. These challenges included stakeholder buy-in, operational safety, procurement uncertainties, adaption of 'off the shelf products, overcoming the 'Fukushima complexity' perception, security concerns, and the initial criteria down select. Hanford Tank Operations Contractor's management identified the need for a workforce protecting low cost robotics solution in the fall of 2017. The project scope generated was part of the response to the Tank Vapor Assessment Team recommendation to enhance the safety of the workforce by utilizing new technology. Since the projects inception, it has been incorporated into the Tank Stewardship Plan. This project was unique to Hanford Tank Operations Contractor, as the company does not frequently incorporate advanced technology for field deployment quickly. The project was also progressive to the Hanford Tank Operations Contractor as it functions as a partnership project with a local university. The first objective of the project is to demonstrate safe operations of autonomous instrumented robotics, monitoring and collecting data, and the wireless transmission of data to a central computing system. Following the completion of this first objective, the project will scale up capabilities of the platform to meet the requests of additional internal stakeholders throughout the tank farms - including completion of specific in-field tasks. (authors)

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Report for Task 15: Developed Tool Verification/Validation Report (Deliverable D11): AGGREGATE: dAta-driven modelinG preservinG contRollable dEr for outaGe mAnagemenT and rEsiliency

This report summarizes the verification report for the developed modules. The team conducted verification in two phases. In phase 1, the modules were validated using offline validation methods and in phase 2 the modules were subjected to real-time validation. This report outlines the approach and the results for the modules under offline and real-time settings. The rest of the report details the functional workflow of AGGREGATE modules, we then transition to offline validation followed by real-time validation of modules. We conclude the report by discussing some of the key points of this report.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗

Program on Earth Observation Data Management Systems (EODMS)

An assessment was made of the needs of a group of potential users of satellite remotely sensed data (state, regional, and local agencies) involved in natural resources management in five states, and alternative data management systems to satisfy these needs are outlined. Tasks described include: (1) a comprehensive data needs analysis of state and local users; (2) the design of remote sensing-derivable information products that serve priority state and local data needs; (3) a cost and performance analysis of alternative processing centers for producing these products; (4) an assessment of the impacts of policy, regulation and government structure on implementing large-scale use of remote sensing technology in this community of users; and (5) the elaboration of alternative institutional arrangements for operational Earth Observation Data Management Systems (EODMS). It is concluded that an operational EODMS will be of most use to state, regional, and local agencies if it provides a full range of information services -- from raw data acquisition to interpretation and dissemination of final information products.

Eastwood, L. F., Jr.↗

Modeling Personnel Turnover in the Parametric Organization

A primary issue in organizing a new parametric cost analysis function is to determine the skill mix and number of personnel required. The skill mix can be obtained by a functional decomposition of the tasks required within the organization and a matrixed correlation with educational or experience backgrounds. The number of personnel is a function of the skills required to cover all tasks, personnel skill background and cross training, the intensity of the workload for each task, migration through various tasks by personnel along a career path, personnel hiring limitations imposed by management and the applicant marketplace, personnel training limitations imposed by management and personnel capability, and the rate at which personnel leave the organization for whatever reason. Faced with the task of relating all of these organizational facets in order to grow a parametric cost analysis (PCA) organization from scratch, it was decided that a dynamic model was required in order to account for the obvious dynamics of the forming organization. The challenge was to create such a simple model which would be credible during all phases of organizational development. The model development process was broken down into the activities of determining the tasks required for PCA, determining the skills required for each PCA task, determining the skills available in the applicant marketplace, determining the structure of the dynamic model, implementing the dynamic model, and testing the dynamic model.

Dean, Edwin B.↗

Strategy to Develop a Control Scheme for Core Thermal Performance Optimization

This report outlines a three-year research plan for optimizing reactor core thermal performance through use of a Digital Twin (DT) model and a set of neutron detectors to correspondingly adapt the reactor control strategy. It identifies reactor features and achievable neutron measurements that factor into this optimization task. It considers spatial effects that are important and how they can be managed by a real-time algorithm that controls reactivity actuators. The report presents a set of tasks, along with corresponding methods, for accomplishing this objective. The final task in this set is to validate the combined optimization procedure in the Purdue University’s PUR-1 reactor, for which we have an agreement of understanding. Additionally, we describe an alternative approach for overcoming some of the limitations inherent in the above approach, which includes the computational costs of high-fidelity simulations and achievable integration of neutron measurements into the DT. The proposed algorithms lower the technology readiness level (TRL) of the overall approach as some additional analysis and the development of a new neutron detector concept are necessary. In particular, a sensor measuring the gradient of the neutron flux is required, and the prototype is expected to be validated in the PUR-1 reactor. The potential benefits and the opportunity to significantly push forward the state-of-the-art make this approach worthy of further exploration in the upcoming years.

22 GENERAL STUDIES OF NUCLEAR REACTORS↗

HH-65A Dolphin digital integrated avionics

Communication, navigation, flight control, and search sensor management are avionics functions which constitute every Search and Rescue (SAR) operation. Routine cockpit duties monopolize crew attention during SAR operations and thus impair crew effectiveness. The United States Coast Guard challenged industry to build an avionics system that automates routine tasks and frees the crew to focus on the mission tasks. The HH-64A SAR avionics systems of communication, navigation, search sensors, and flight control have existed independently. On the SRR helicopter, the flight management system (FMS) was introduced. H coordinates or integrates these functions. The pilot interacts with the FMS rather than the individual subsystems, using simple, straightforward procedures to address distinct mission tasks and the flight management system, in turn, orchestrates integrated system response.

Huntoon, R. B.↗

The Fabric for Frontier Experiments Project at Fermilab

The FabrIc for Frontier Experiments (FIFE) project is a new, far-reaching initiative within the Fermilab Scientific Computing Division to drive the future of computing services for experiments at FNAL and elsewhere. It is a collaborative effort between computing professionals and experiment scientists to produce an end-to-end, fully integrated set of services for computing on the grid and clouds, managing data, accessing databases, and collaborating within experiments. FIFE includes 1) easy to use job submission services for processing physics tasks on the Open Science Grid and elsewhere, 2) an extensive data management system for managing local and remote caches, cataloging, querying, moving, and tracking the use of data, 3) custom and generic database applications for calibrations, beam information, and other purposes, 4) collaboration tools including an electronic log book, speakers bureau database, and experiment membership database. All of these aspects will be discussed in detail. FIFE sets the direction of computing at Fermilab experiments now and in the future, and therefore is a major driver in the design of computing services worldwide.

Kirby, Michael↗

MSASGCN : Multi-Head Self-Attention Spatiotemporal Graph Convolutional Network for Traffic Flow Forecasting

Traffic flow forecasting is an essential task of an intelligent transportation system (ITS), closely related to intelligent transportation management and resource scheduling. Dynamic spatial-temporal dependencies in traffic data make traffic flow forecasting to be a challenging task. Most existing research cannot model dynamic spatial and temporal correlations to achieve well-forecasting performance. The multi-head self-attention mechanism is a valuable method to capture dynamic spatial-temporal correlations, and combining it with graph convolutional networks is a promising solution. Therefore, we propose a multi-head self-attention spatiotemporal graph convolutional network (MSASGCN) model. It can effectively capture local correlations and potential global correlations of spatial structures, can handle dynamic evolution of the road network, and, in the time dimension, can effectively capture dynamic temporal correlations. Experiments on two real datasets verify the stability of our proposed model, obtaining a better prediction performance than the baseline algorithms. The correlation metrics get significantly reduced compared with traditional time series prediction methods and deep learning methods without using graph neural networks, according to MAE and RMSE results. Compared with advanced traffic flow forecasting methods, our model also has a performance improvement and a more stable prediction performance. We also discuss some problems and challenges in traffic forecasting.

Cao, Yang↗

Adjunct laboratory tests in support of US/German salt characterization program

In summary, the goal of this activity is to complete a subset of a test matrix on salt from the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) undertaken by German research groups. The work will be performed at RESPEC in Rapid City, South Dakota, and is divided into three tasks.

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Results for the first quarter calendar year 2017 tank 50H salt solution sample

In this memorandum, the chemical and radionuclide contaminant results from the First Quarter Calendar Year 2017 (CY17) sample of Tank 50H salt solution are presented in tabulated form. The First Quarter CY17 Tank 50H samples [a 200 mL sample obtained 6” below the surface (HTF-50-17-7) and a 1 L sample obtained 66” from the tank bottom (HTF-50-17-8)] were obtained on January 15, 2017 and received at Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) on January 16, 2017. Prior to obtaining the samples from Tank 50H, a single pump was run at least 4.4 hours and the samples were pulled immediately after pump shut down. All volatile organic analysis (VOA) and semi-volatile organic analysis (SVOA) were performed on the surface sample and all other analyses were performed on the variable depth sample. The information from this characterization will be used by Savannah River Remediation (SRR) for the transfer of aqueous waste from Tank 50H to the Saltstone Production Facility, where the waste will be treated and disposed of in the Saltstone Disposal Facility. This memorandum compares results, where applicable, to Saltstone Waste Acceptance Criteria (WAC) limits and targets. The chemical and radionuclide contaminant results from the characterization of the First Quarter CY17 sampling of Tank 50H were requested by SRR personnel and details of the testing are presented in the SRNL Task Technical and Quality Assurance Plan (TTQAP). This memorandum is part of Deliverable 2 from SRR request. Data pertaining to the regulatory limits for Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) metals will be documented at a later time per the TTQAP for the Tank 50H saltstone task.

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