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Comprehensive Federal fleet management guide offered as a companion to Executive Order 13514 Section 12 guidance.
The MIT Clean Energy Prize (MIT CEP) is a venture creation and innovation competition to encourage innovation in the energy space, specifically with regard to clean energy. The Competition invited student teams from any US university to submit student-led ventures that demonstrate a high potential of successfully making clean energy more affordable, with a positive impact on the environment. By focusing on student ventures, the MIT CEP aims to educate the next generation of clean energy entrepreneurs. Teams receive valuable mentoring and hard deadlines that complement the cash prize to accelerate development of ventures. The competition is a year-long educational process that culminates in the selection of five category finalists and a Grand Prize winner and the distribution of cash prizes to each of those teams. Each entry was submitted in one of five clean energy categories: Renewables, Clean Non-Renewables, Energy Efficiency, Transportation, and Deployment.
The U.S. photovoltaic (PV) industry is forecast to grow, and it represents an opportunity for economic development and job creation in communities throughout the United States. This report helps U.S. cities evaluate economic opportunities in the PV industry. It serves as a guide for local economic development offices in evaluating their community's competitiveness in the solar PV industry, assessing the viability of solar PV development goals, and developing strategies for recruiting and retaining PV companies to their areas.
The mission of the Department of Energy is to ensure America's security and prosperity by addressing its energy, environmental, and nuclear challenges through transformative science and technology solutions. Goal 1 is to catalyze the timely, material, and efficient transformation of the nation's energy system and secure U.S. leadership in clean energy technologies. Goal 2 is to maintain a vibrant U.S. effort in science and engineering as a cornerstone of our economic prosperity with clear leadership in strategic areas. Goal 3 is to enhance nuclear security through defense, nonproliferation, and environmental efforts. Goal 4 is to establish an operational and adaptable framework that combines the best wisdom of all Department stakeholders to maximize mission success.
Cleary [2007] divides the proliferation pathway into stages: diversion, facility misuse, transportation, transformation, and weapons fabrication. King [2010], using Cleary's methodology, compares a deepburn fusion-driven blanket containing weapons-grade plutonium with a PWR burning MOX fuel enrichments of 5-9%. King considers the stages of theft, transportation, transformation, and nuclear explosive fabrication. In the current study of used fuel storage security, a similar approach is appropriate. First, one must consider the adversary's objective, which can be categorized as on-site radionuclide dispersion, theft of material for later radionuclide dispersion, and theft of material for later processing and fabrication into a nuclear explosive. For on-site radionuclide dispersion, only a single proliferation pathway stage is appropriate: dispersion. That situation will be addressed in future reports. For later radionuclide dispersion, the stages are theft, transportation, and transformation (from oxide spent fuel containing both fission products and actinides to a material size and shape suitable for dispersion). For later processing and fabrication into a nuclear explosive, the stages are theft (by an outsider or by facility misuse by an insider), transportation, transformation (from oxide spent fuel containing both fission products and actinides to a metal alloy), and fabrication (of the alloy into a weapon). It should be noted that the theft and transportation stages are similar, and possibly identical, for later radionuclide dispersion and later processing and fabrication into a nuclear explosive. Each stage can be evaluated separately, and the methodology can vary for each stage. For example, King starts with the methodology of Cleary for the theft, transportation, transformation, and fabrication stages. Then, for each stage, King assembles and modifies the attributes and inputs suggested by Cleary. In the theft (also known as diversion) stage, Cleary has five high-level categories (material handling during diversion, difficulty of evading detection by the accounting system, difficulty of evading detection by the material control system, difficulty of conducting undeclared facility modifications for the purpose of diverting nuclear material, and difficulty of evading detection of the facility modifications for the purposes of diverting nuclear material). Each category has one or more subcategories. For example, the first category includes mass per significant quantity (SQ) of nuclear material, volume/SQ of nuclear material, number of items/SQ, material form (solid, liquid, powder, gas), radiation level in terms of dose, chemical reactivity, heat load, and process temperature. King adds the following two subcategories to that list: SQs available for theft, and interruptions/changes (normal and unexpected) in material stocks and flows. For the situation of an orphaned surface storage facility, this approach is applicable, with some of the categories and subcategories being modified to reflect the static situation (no additions or removals of fuel or containers). In addition, theft would require opening a large overpack and either removing a full container or opening that sealed container and then removing one or more spent nuclear fuel assemblies. These activities would require time without observation (detection), heavy-duty equipment, and some degree of protection of the thieves from radiological dose. In the transportation stage, Cleary has two high-level categories (difficulty of handling material during transportation, and difficulty of evading detection during transport). Each category has a number of subcategories. For the situation of an orphaned surface storage facility, these categories are applicable. The transformation stage of Cleary has three high-level categories (facilities and equipment needed to process diverted materials; knowledge, skills, and workforce needed to process diverted materials; and difficulty of evading detection of transformation activities). Again, there are subcategories. King [2007] adds a fourth high-level category: time required to transform the materials. For the situation of an orphaned surface storage facility, the categories are applicable, but the evaluations of each category and subcategory will be significantly different for later radionuclide dispersion than for later processing and fabrication into a nuclear explosive. The fabrication stage of Cleary has three high-level categories (difficulty associated with design, handling difficulties, and knowledge and skills needed to design and fabricate). King replaces the first two high-level categories with the Figure of Merit for Nuclear Explosives Utility (FOM), with subcategories of bare critical mass, heat content of transformed material, dose rate of transformed material, and SQs available for theft. The next section of this report describes the FOM in more detail.
The purpose of this report is to provide a concise status update for value-added products (VAP) implemented by the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Climate Research Facility. The report is divided into the following sections: (1) new VAPs for which development has begun, (2) progress on existing VAPs, (3) future VAPs that have been recently approved, (4) other work that leads to a VAP, and (5) top requested VAPs from the archive
This quarterly magazine is dedicated to stepping beyond the technical journals to reveal NREL's vital work in a real-world context for our stakeholders. Continuum provides insights into the latest and most impactful clean energy innovations, while spotlighting those talented researchers and unique facilities that make it all happen. This edition focuses on creating a utility-scale future.
This quarterly newsletter provides timely news and information about the plans and progress of the Energy Development in Island Nations-U.S. Virgin Islands pilot project, including significant events and milestones, work undertaken by each of the five working groups, and project-related renewable energy and energy efficiency educational outreach and technology deployment efforts.
This case study covers the process of successfully integrating photovoltaic (PV) systems into a low-income housing development in northeast Denver, Colorado, focusing specifically on a new financing model and job training. The Northeast Denver Housing Center (NDHC), working in cooperation with Del Norte Neighborhood Development Corporation, Groundwork Denver, and the National Renewable EnergyLaboratory (NREL), was able to finance the PV system installations by blending private equity funding with utility rebates, federal tax credits, and public sector funding. A grant provided by the Governor's Energy Office allowed for the creation of the new financing model. In addition, the program incorporated an innovative low-income job training program and an energy conservation incentiveprogram.
We have very recently discovered a new hydrogen-producing photocatalyst is BiNbO4. BiNbO4 powders prepared by solid state reaction were tested for photocatalytic activity in methanol solutions under UV irradiation. When the material is tested without the presence of a Pt co-catalyst, photocatalytic activity for H2 evolution is superior to that of TiO2. It was also found that BiNbO4 photodegrades into metallic Bi and reduced Nb oxides after use; materials were characterized by SEM, XRD, and XPS. Adding Pt to the surface of the photocatalyst increases photocatalytic activity and importantly, helps to prevent photodegradation of the oxide material. With 1 wt. % Pt loading, photodegradation is essentially absent. BiNbO4 photodegrades into metallic Bi and reduced Nb oxides after use; materials were characterized by SEM, XRD, and XPS. Adding Pt to the surface of the photocatalyst increases photocatalytic activity and importantly, helps to prevent photodegradation of the oxide material. With 1 wt. % Pt loading, photodegradation is essentially absent.
Biannual newsletter for the U.S. Department of Energy's Clean Cities initiative. The newsletter includes feature stories on advanced vehicle deployment, idle reduction, and articles on Clean Cities coalition successes across the country.
This proposal emphasizes investigations of the thermal and electrical transport properties of new and novel solid-state materials, with the specific goal of achieving higher efficiency solid-state thermoelectric materials. This program will continue to build a very strong collaborative research effort between researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ONRL) and Clemson University. We propose three new faculty hires and major equipment purchases in order to further enhance our level of national recognition. We will be positioned for competition for major non-EPSCoR DOE and DOD funding (i.e. NSF-Materials Research Center) and able to address many other areas of DOE and national importance. Graduate and undergraduate students will be extensively involved in this project, spending significant time at ORNL, thus gaining important training and educational opportunities. We will also include an outreach program to bring in outside students and faculty. An External Advisory Board of distinguished scientists will provide oversight to the program.
The U.S. marine energy industry is actively pursuing development of offshore wind and marine hydrokinetic (MHK) energy systems. Experience in the wind energy sector demonstrates that new technology development requires thorough measurement and characterization of the environmental conditions prevalent at installation sites and of technology operating in the field. Presently, there are no turn-keyinstrumentation system solutions that meet the measurement needs of the marine energy industry. The 1st Advanced Marine Renewable Energy Instrumentation Experts Workshop brought together technical experts from government laboratories, academia, and industry representatives from marine energy, wind, offshore oil and gas, and instrumentation developers to present and discuss the instrumentationneeds of the marine energy industry. The goals of the meeting were to: 1. Share the latest relevant knowledge among technical experts; 2. Review relevant state-of-the-art field measurement technologies and methods; 3. Review lessons learned from recent field deployments; 4. Identify synergies across different industries; 5. Identify gaps between existing and needed instrumentation capabilities;6. Understand who are the leading experts; 7. Provide a forum where stakeholders from the marine energy industry could provide substantive input in the development of new marine energy field deployable instrumentation packages.
This report is a summary of research that has been conducted under the auspices of a US DOE grant (DE-FG-08GO88151) and is a compilation of the efforts of a significant portion of the Audubon Sugar Institute faculty and staff. This project continued the developments initiated under DOE Awards No. DE-FC36-04GO14236 and DE-FG -05GO85007. There, the focus was on the development of a technology for a bagasse based biorefinery that will give sufficient economic advantage when integrated with a cane raw sugar mill, to support low-cost ethanol production. The purpose of this work is to lay the foundation for utilization of new grassy crops that can be utilized in a sugarcane raw mill based biorefinery. Determination of the appropriate payment analysis technique, pre-processing requirements and operational conditions for each feedstock is within the scope of this project. In addition to agronomic data, a foundation of basic analytical information on composition, handling characteristics, response to pretreatment, and fermentability of pretreated biomass hydrolysates were developed.
This is the final progress report for the FastOS (Phase 2) (FastOS-2) project with Argonne National Laboratory and the University of Oregon (UO). The project started at UO on July 1, 2008 and ran until April 30, 2010, at which time a six-month no-cost extension began. The FastOS-2 work at UO delivered excellent results in all research work areas: * scalable parallel monitoring * kernel-level performance measurement * parallel I/0 system measurement * large-scale and hybrid application performance measurement * onlne scalable performance data reduction and analysis * binary instrumentation
This report examines the accuracy of measurements that rely on Doppler LIDAR systems to determine their applicability to wind turbine feed-forward control systems and discusses feed-forward control system designs that use preview wind measurements.
This report describes the status of research being performed under CRADA No. SC10/01771.00 (Lead/Carbon Functionality in VRLA Batteries) between Sandia National Laboratories and East Penn Manufacturing, conducted for the U.S. Department of Energy's Energy Storage Systems Program. The Quarter 3 Milestone was completed on time. The milestone entails an ex situ analysis of a control as well as three carbon-containing negative plates in the raw, as cast form as well as after formation. The morphology, porosity, and porosity distribution within each plate was evaluated. In addition, baseline electrochemical measurements were performed on each battery to establish their initial performance. These measurements included capacity, internal resistance, and float current. The results obtained for the electrochemical testing were in agreement with previous evaluations performed at East Penn manufacturing. Cycling on a subset of the received East Penn cells containing different carbons (and a control) has been initiated.
This report describes the status of research being performed under CRADA No. SC10/01771.00 (Lead/Carbon Functionality in VRLA Batteries) between Sandia National Laboratories and East Penn Manufacturing, conducted for the U.S. Department of Energy's Energy Storage Systems Program. The Quarter 4 Milestone was completed on time. The milestone entails the initiation of high rate, partial state of charge (HRPSoC) cycling of the carbon enhanced batteries. The morphology, porosity, and porosity distribution within the plates after 1k and 10k cycles were documented, illustrating the changes which take place in the early life of the carbon containing batteries, and as the battery approaches failure due to hard sulfation for the control battery. Longer term cycling on a subset of the received East Penn cells containing different carbons (and a control) continues, and will progress into FY12. Carbon has been explored as an addition to lead-acid battery electrodes in a number of ways. Perhaps the most notable to date has been the hybrid 'Ultrabattery' developed by CSIRO where an asymmetric carbon-based electrochemical capacitor is combined with a lead-acid battery into a single cell, dramatically improving high-rate partial-state-of-charge (HRPSoC) operation. As illustrated below, the 'Ultrabattery' is a hybrid device constructed using a traditional lead-acid battery positive plate (i.e., PbO2) and a negative electrode consisting of a carbon electrode in parallel with a lead-acid negative plate. This device exhibits a dramatically improved cycle life over traditional VRLA batteries, as well as increased charge power and charge acceptance. The 'Ultrabattery' has been produced successfully by both The Furukawa Battery Co. and East Penn Manufacturing. An example illustrating the dramatic improvement in cycle life of the Ultrabattery over a conventional VRLA battery is shown in a graph. In addition to the aforementioned hybrid device, carbon has also been added directly to traditional VRLA batteries as an admixture in both the positive and negative plates, the latter of which has been found to result in similar improvements to battery performance under high-rate partial-state-of-charge (HRPSoC) operation. It is this latter construction, where carbon is added directly to the negative active material (NAM) that is the specific incarnation being evaluated through this program. Thus, the carbon-modified (or Pb-C) battery (termed the 'Advanced' VRLA battery by East Penn Manufacturing) is a traditional VRLA battery where an additional component has been added to the negative electrode during production of the negative plate. The addition of select carbon materials to the NAM of VRLA batteries has been demonstrated to increase cycle life by an order of magnitude or more under (HRPSoC) operation. Additionally, battery capacity increases on cycling and, in fact, exceeds the performance of the batteries when new.