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All sources NASA NTRS DOE OSTI

DOE OSTI2023

TOWARDS RAPID RESPONSE UPDATES OF POPULATIONS AT RISK

Understanding population at risks has been a focus of the LandScan program through its development of population estimates. With advancements in computer vision, deep learning technologies and access to High Performance Computing (HPC) and high resolution imagery, population estimates are now modeled at the building level. However, when those patterns are disrupted, rapid updates to population distribution estimates are needed to support humanitarian aid and response. Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) recently adapted an existing deep learning building footprint extraction model in development of a scalable approach to Building Damage Assessments (BDA). This new opportunity opens the possibility of automating BDA to support rapid population distribution estimate updates for geographic areas involved in geopolitical conflicts or natural events for humanitarian aid and response or where to focus recovery efforts. In addition, incorporate social surveys to further model human behavior under conflict or other scenarios that disrupt normal patterns of life.

Urban, Marie↗

DOE OSTI2023

Roots selectively decompose litter to mine nitrogen and build new soil carbon

Abstract Plant–microbe interactions in the rhizosphere shape carbon and nitrogen cycling in soil organic matter (SOM). However, there is conflicting evidence on whether these interactions lead to a net loss or increase of SOM. In part, this conflict is driven by uncertainty in how living roots and microbes alter SOM formation or loss in the field. To address these uncertainties, we traced the fate of isotopically labelled litter into SOM using root and fungal ingrowth cores incubated in a Miscanthus x giganteus field. Roots stimulated litter decomposition, but balanced this loss by transferring carbon into aggregate associated SOM. Further, roots selectively mobilized nitrogen from litter without additional carbon release. Overall, our findings suggest that roots mine litter nitrogen and protect soil carbon.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

DOE OSTI2022

Phylogenomic analysis of the hemp family (Cannabaceae) reveals deep cyto‐nuclear discordance and provides new insights into generic relationships

Abstract Cannabaceae are a relatively small family of angiosperms, but they include several species of huge economic and cultural significance: marijuana or hemp ( Cannabis sativa ) and hops ( Humulus lupulus ). Previous phylogenetic studies have clarified the most deep relationships in Cannabaceae, but relationships remain ambiguous among several major lineages. Here, we sampled 82 species representing all genera of Cannabaceae and utilized a new dataset of 90 nuclear genes and 82 chloroplast loci from Hyb‐Seq to investigate the phylogenomics of Cannabaceae. Nuclear phylogenetic analyses revealed a robust and consistent backbone for Cannabaceae. We observed nuclear gene‐tree conflict at several deep nodes in inferred species trees, also cyto‐nuclear discordance concerning the relationship between Gironniera and Lozanella and the relationships among Trema s.l. (including Parasponia ), Cannabis + Humulus , and Chaetachme + Pteroceltis . Coalescent simulations and network analyses suggest that observed deep cyto‐nuclear discordances were most likely to stem from incomplete lineage sorting (ILS); nuclear gene‐tree conflict might be caused by both ILS and gene flow between species. All genera of Cannabaceae were recovered as monophyletic, except for Celtis , which consisted of two distinct clades: Celtis I (including most Celtis species) and Celtis II (including Celtis gomphophylla and Celtis schippii ). We suggest that Celtis II should be recognized as the independent genus Sparrea based on both molecular and morphological evidence. Our work provides the most comprehensive and reliable phylogeny to date for Cannabaceae, enabling further exploration of evolutionary patterns across this family and highlighting the necessity of comparing nuclear with chloroplast data to examine the evolutionary history of plant groups.

Plant Sciences↗

DOE OSTI2020

Safe and Private Forward-trading Platform for Transactive Microgrids

Power grids are evolving at an unprecedented pace due to the rapid growth of distributed energy resources (DER) in communities. These resources are very different from traditional power sources, as they are located closer to loads and thus can significantly reduce transmission losses and carbon emissions. However, their intermittent and variable nature often results in spikes in the overall demand on distribution system operators (DSO). To manage these challenges, there has been a surge of interest in building decentralized control schemes, where a pool of DERs combined with energy storage devices can exchange energy locally to smooth fluctuations in net demand. Building a decentralized market for transactive microgrids is challenging, because even though a decentralized system provides resilience, it also must satisfy requirements such as privacy, efficiency, safety, and security, which are often in conflict with each other. As such, existing implementations of decentralized markets often focus on resilience and safety but compromise on privacy. In this article, we describe our platform, called TRANSAX, which enables participants to trade in an energy futures market, which improves efficiency by finding feasible matches for energy trades, enabling DSOs to plan their energy needs better. TRANSAX provides privacy to participants by anonymizing their trading activity using a distributed mixing service, while also enforcing constraints that limit trading activity based on safety requirements, such as keeping planned energy flow below line capacity. We show that TRANSAX can satisfy the seemingly conflicting requirements of efficiency, safety, and privacy. We also provide an analysis of how much trading efficiency is lost. Trading efficiency is improved through the problem formulation, which accounts for temporal flexibility, and system efficiency is improved using a hybrid-solver architecture. Lastly, we describe a testbed to run experiments and demonstrate its performance using simulation results.

29 ENERGY PLANNING, POLICY, AND ECONOMY↗

DOE OSTI2025

Development of Emergency Vehicle Preemption Strategies on Smart Corridors in a Digital Twin Environment

Emergency Response Vehicles (ERVs), such as firetrucks, ambulances, etc. operate with the purpose of saving lives and mitigating property damage. As such, ERV travel-time reductions may result in significant benefits to the community. A common strategy to improve travel times is Emergency Vehicle Preemption (EVP). EVP seeks to reduce ERV delays by providing the right-of-way to ERVs as they approach an intersection. This study proposes a new Dynamic Preemption strategy that determines the need for preemption prior to the ERV reaching the vicinity of the intersection, utilizing real-time data streams. This paper evaluates the effectiveness of some existing and proposed preempt control strategies using a digital twin testbed consisting of a series of signalized intersections on an urban arterial in Georgia. The best EVP strategy maximizes the improvement in ERV travel time while minimizing the adverse effect of preemption on the traffic in conflicting directions. Therefore, this study evaluates both the positive impact of EVP on the ERV as well as the adverse impact on the cross-street traffic. The study found that the potential exists for significant improvements in ERV travel time with the proposed Dynamic Preemption strategy, with minimal impact to the conflicting traffic. For the simulation corridor there was a 20% reduction in the ERV travel times with the implementation of the Dynamic Preemption strategy, compared to traditional EVP practices.

Roy, Somdut [Georgia Institute of Technology]↗

DOE OSTI2025

GreenThrift: Optimizing Carbon and Cost for Flexible Residential Loads

Reducing buildings’ carbon emissions is an important sustainability challenge. While scheduling flexible building loads has been previously used for a variety of grid and energy optimizations, carbon footprint reduction using such flexible loads poses new challenges since such methods need to balance both energy and carbon costs while also reducing user inconvenience from delaying such loads. This paper highlights the potential conflict between electricity prices and carbon emissions and the resulting trade-offs in carbon-aware and cost-aware load scheduling. To address this trade-off, we propose GreenThrift, a home automation system that leverages the scheduling capabilities of smart appliances and knowledge of future carbon intensity and cost to reduce both the carbon emissions and costs of flexible energy loads. At the heart of GreenThrift is an optimization technique that automatically computes schedules based on user configurations and preferences. We evaluate the effectiveness of GreenThrift using real-world carbon intensity data, electricity prices, and load traces from multiple locations and across different scenarios and objectives. Our results show that GreenThrift can replicate the offline optimal and retains 97% of the savings when optimizing the carbon emissions. Moreover, we show how GreenThrift can balance the conflict between carbon and cost and retain 95.3% and 85.5% of the potential carbon and cost savings, respectively.

29 ENERGY PLANNING, POLICY, AND ECONOMY↗

DOE OSTI2022

Modeling protected species distributions and habitats to inform siting and management of pioneering ocean industries: A case study for Gulf of Mexico aquaculture

Marine Spatial Planning (MSP) provides a process that uses spatial data and models to evaluate environmental, social, economic, cultural, and management trade-offs when siting (i.e., strategically locating) ocean industries. Aquaculture is the fastest-growing food sector in the world. The United States (U.S.) has substantial opportunity for offshore aquaculture development given the size of its exclusive economic zone, habitat diversity, and variety of candidate species for cultivation. However, promising aquaculture areas overlap many protected species habitats. Aquaculture siting surveys, construction, operations, and decommissioning can alter protected species habitat and behavior. Additionally, aquaculture-associated vessel activity, underwater noise, and physical interactions between protected species and farms can increase the risk of injury and mortality. In 2020, the U.S. Gulf of Mexico was identified as one of the first regions to be evaluated for offshore aquaculture opportunities as directed by a Presidential Executive Order. We developed a transparent and repeatable method to identify aquaculture opportunity areas (AOAs) with the least conflict with protected species. First, we developed a generalized scoring approach for protected species that captures their vulnerability to adverse effects from anthropogenic activities using conservation status and demographic information. Next, we applied this approach to data layers for eight species listed under the Endangered Species Act, including five species of sea turtles, Rice’s whale, smalltooth sawfish, and giant manta ray. Next, we evaluated four methods for mathematically combining scores (i.e., Arithmetic mean, Geometric mean, Product, Lowest Scoring layer) to generate a combined protected species data layer. The Product approach provided the most logical ordering of, and the greatest contrast in, site suitability scores. Finally, we integrated the combined protected species data layer into a multi-criteria decision-making modeling framework for MSP. This process identified AOAs with reduced potential for protected species conflict. These modeling methods are transferable to other regions, to other sensitive or protected species, and for spatial planning for other ocean-uses.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

DOE OSTI2020

2020 State of the Science Report, Chapter 11: Marine Spatial Planning and Marine Renewable Energy

Marine spatial planning (MSP) is advocated internationally as an improved approach to managing marine activities that addresses competing sectors and balances environmental, social, and economic interests. The benefits of MSP are cited as being increased transparency and certainty for industry, improved environmental protection, reduced sectoral conflicts, and providing opportunities for synergies. Approaches to implementation of MSP vary by country and sometimes within countries. As a relatively new and novel approach to managing marine activities, it can be difficult to determine when success has occurred or what might constitute more effective and efficient management systems. The growth of marine renewable energy (MRE) will result in the increasing use of sea space and potential for conflict with existing marine uses, both of which can be addressed, in part, through implementation of MSP. https://tethys.pnnl.gov/publications/state-of-the-science-2020-chapter-11-marine-spatial-planning

16 TIDAL AND WAVE POWER↗

DOE OSTI2021

MRSt S Specifications Report

The MRSt spectrometer is a magnetic spectrometer designed for momentum analyzing deuterons (10.7 – 14.2 MeV). The MRSt spectrometer will be attached to the target chamber of the National Ignition Facility (NIF) at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNS), Livermore, California. This document defines the technical requirements for the design, analysis, fabrication, inspection, testing and delivery of the complete set of magnets, vacuum chambers, and accessories to become part of the spectrometer. The interface issues, including the support structures, need to be defined later by LLNS and the vendor, which will require time and dialog before a solution can be found. This “Specification Report for the MRSt-S System”, January 19, 2020 is based on and supersedes an earlier version “Specification Report for the MRSt-S System”, May 1, 2019 The vendor shall check these specifications for possible conflicts between statements in this document. Possible solutions to any such conflicts should be included in the proposal submitted by the vendor. The proposal shall also include the delivery FOB destination LLNS.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗

DOE OSTI2021

The Role of Nuclear-Conventional Intermingling on State Decision-making and the Risk of Inadvertent Escalation

The questions answered by this report are: What are the implications of nuclear and conventional intermingling on crisis stability and the potential risk of miscalculation?, and Specifically, how might entanglement influence US and competitor decision making during crisis and conflict? In practice, there are three main forms of nuclear-conventional intermingling. First, intermingling between nuclear and non-nuclear weapon systems can occur via the fielding of dual capable delivery systems like missiles or aircraft. Second, intermingling can happen due to the co-location of nuclear and non-nuclear forces and their support structures—for example, the co-location of strategic bombers and general-purpose aircraft, or the co-location of strategic submarines and general-purpose vessels. Third, intermingling can occur via convolving nuclear and conventional military command and control systems, to include ballistic missile early warning and potentially space surveillance systems as well. All three forms of nuclear-conventional intermingling have significantly increased since the end of the Cold War, driven by both technological and doctrinal changes. However, there are important differences in the rationale behind, and also the risks associated with these three different forms of intermingling. The mere existence of dual capable systems is not new— deploying such systems can increase the effectiveness of forces, and it can also provide more flexibility. The major powers have both employed and threatened with dual capable systems for decades, and they have done so without nuclear escalation. Similarly, the major powers co-located nuclear and conventional systems in the Cold War, and they did so for variety of reasons that had nothing to do with complicating the adversary’s risk calculus. The Soviet Union, for example, decided to co-locate its nuclear and conventional forces for economic and administrative reasons. Although today it might be recognized as a useful deterrent tool, it was not their primary intention. Major powers want to convince rivals that the co-location of forces creates a high bar for targeting and raises the risk of nuclear escalation, but they also want to have the flexibility of this not being true in an actual crisis or conflict.

29 ENERGY PLANNING, POLICY, AND ECONOMY↗

DOE OSTI2024

US Perspectives on the Conventional/Nuclear Interactions and the Impacts on Nuclear Escalation Risks and Future Arms Control Prospects

This short paper is organized around a few discrete questions. How have U.S. perspectives on conventional and nuclear interactions evolved in recent years? How have these changing perspectives shaped U.S. thinking on perceived nuclear escalation risks with Russia, both long standing and newly emerged? And finally, what do these U.S. perceptions of interactions and risks mean for future potential arms control either in the conventional or nuclear arena? The answers to these questions appear to show some promise for future work in this area. Conventional and nuclear interactions are increasing, and thus the two domains cannot be kept as deliberately or artificially separated as in the past. There is a growing mutual recognition regarding the interplay between conventional and nuclear capabilities in the strategic stability equation. There is also an increasingly shared recognition in the United States and Russia that nuclear escalation risks are likely to originate in conventional crises or conflict, placing an imperative on some form of conflict prevention procedures at the lower end of the spectrum. This requirement suggests some potential areas for risk reduction measures outside of those traditionally considered in conventional and nuclear arms control over the past several decades.

98 NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT, SAFEGUARDS, AND PHYSICAL P↗

DOE OSTI2024

The VIBES Are Shifting: Assessing Emergent Capabilities in Multi-Modal Models

Researchers assessing open-source domains such as the internet, and particularly those studying information conflict, often have no single prescribed workflow. In the course of their research, they may need to perform a diverse array of tasks far beyond simply identifying an ever-changing set of objects. These analytical tasks can include ascertaining the provenance of images, understand an image in the context of accompanying text-based data, or identifying indicators of digital image manipulation. They must further be able to do this at the scale of tens of thousands of images or more. Traditional machine vision models have typically lacked the flexibility and breadth of performance sufficient for these needs. The research team from Pacific Northwest National Laboratory assessed the performance of a single baseline CLIP ViT-L model against a series of analytical tasks relevant for the study of online information conflict.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

DOE OSTI2025

How Quantum Sensing Will Help Solve GPS Denial in Warfare

The U.S. military’s ability to posture, deter, and prevail in future conflicts may rest on the quantum sensing position, navigation, and timing (PNT) capabilities that are currently being developed. Heavy reliance on GPS signals for PNT has become a critical vulnerability for the U.S. military. Meanwhile, the conflict in Ukraine has demonstrated that GPS denial and electronic warfare (EW) is now a key component of modern combat and satellite-guided munitions are reportedly being rendered ineffective. The Department of Defense (DOD) is focusing on upgrading GPS to use stronger, military-specific signals, which will still be vulnerable to EW and anti-satellite capabilities. A more diverse and resilient alternate-PNT strategy is needed to ensure mission success.

45 MILITARY TECHNOLOGY, WEAPONRY, AND NATIONAL DEF↗

DOE OSTI2023

Balancing renewable energy and river resources by moving from individual assessments of hydropower projects to energy system planning

As governments and non-state actors strive to minimize global warming, a primary strategy is the decarbonization of power systems which will require a massive increase in renewable electricity generation. Leading energy agencies forecast a doubling of global hydropower capacity as part of that necessary expansion of renewables. While hydropower provides generally low-carbon generation and can integrate variable renewables, such as wind and solar, into electrical grids, hydropower dams are one of the primary reasons that only one-third of the world’s major rivers remain free-flowing. This loss of free-flowing rivers has contributed to dramatic declines of migratory fish and sediment delivery to agriculturally productive deltas. Further, the reservoirs behind dams have displaced tens of millions of people. Thus, hydropower challenges the world’s efforts to meet climate targets while simultaneously achieving other Sustainable Development Goals. In this paper, we explore strategies to achieve the needed renewable energy expansion while sustaining the diverse social and environmental benefits of rivers. These strategies can be implemented at scales ranging from the individual project (environmental flows, fish passage and other site-level mitigation) to hydropower cascades to river basins and regional electrical power systems. While we review evidence that project-level management and mitigation can reduce environmental and social costs, we posit that the most effective scale for finding balanced solutions occurs at the scale of power systems. We further hypothesize that the pursuit of solutions at the system scale can also provide benefits for investors, developers and governments; evidence of benefits to these actors will be necessary for achieving broad uptake of the approaches described in this paper. We test this hypothesis through cases from Chile and Uganda that demonstrate the potential for system-scale power planning to allow countries to meet low-carbon energy targets with power systems that avoid damming high priority rivers (e.g., those that would cause conflicts with other social and environmental benefits) for a similar system cost as status quo approaches. We also show that, through reduction of risk and potential conflict, strategic planning of hydropower site selection can improve financial performance for investors and developers, with a case study from Colombia.

Opperman, Jeffrey J.↗

DOE OSTI2020

Implementing Mixed Reality Tools to Support Mission Delivery at Hanford - 20520

Mission Support Alliance's (MSA) Public Works and Information Systems organizations have been working with Microsoft Corporation to develop and implement mixed reality operational solutions using their HoloLens technology. This collaborative effort is intended to drive innovative solutions and significantly improve MSA's efficiency in performing work at the Hanford Site. HoloLens, a mixed reality tool, is a commercial off-the-shelf technology that combines a head-mounted viewing screen with applications to help people and organizations learn, communicate, and collaborate more effectively through the use of mixed reality. https://microsoft.com/en-us/hololens MSA's initial pilot successfully demonstrated its ability to use mixed reality utilizing HoloLens' advanced features in a variety of ways, illustrating the potential efficiency gains previously stated as goals of this pilot. These achievements include the development of proprietary technology that allows synchronization between a HoloLens device and a mobile device or alternate global positioning system (GPS) device. This synchronization enables the HoloLens device to access real time GPS location data anywhere on the Hanford Site. This real time location data, combined with MSA's improved Hanford Geographical Information System (GIS) data, enables the mixed reality pilot application to identify underground utility systems as well as related utility attributes. This ability will aid utility workers in several areas, including excavation activities, the placement of large cranes, identifying interactions and conflicts with future underground utility placements and, eventually, recognizing and de-conflicting tank waste transfer system valve alignments. The HoloLens mixed reality application is also able to provide full or small scale holographic images of a facility's digital twin. This feature will allow MSA's Water and Sewer Utilities team to train and validate procedures associated with the new water treatment facility virtually, before it is constructed. This reduces the amount of time it takes to complete the training and procedure validation, and accelerates the overall construction schedule. (authors)

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE W↗

DOE OSTI2024

The Meaning of Risk for Safety, Security, and Safeguards in the Design of Advanced Nuclear Reactors

What is the meaning of risk as it applies to the design of advanced reactors in the disciplines of safety, security, and safeguards? How can we find common terminology for the concept of risk and how can we find interfaces between these disciplines? These are important questions that should be explored in order that they may be applied in an integrated manner for the most effective and efficient design approaches. Eliminating or minimizing risks is a key design driver that motivates and informs the development of nuclear reactors. For safety, risk is well understood and applied in Probabilistic Risk Assessments. For security, the risk-based concepts of vulnerability assessments and vital areas are all considered in designing security systems. For safeguards, the concept of risk is not formally defined, as it relates to the design and operation of nuclear reactors. International nuclear safeguards seek to reduce the risk of proliferation in the nuclear fuel cycle and as such the concept of risk does exist. Therefore, the current understanding of the “3S’ approach, which seeks to find the interfaces and conflicts between safety, security, and safeguards requires a thorough understanding of the role that the reduction of risk plays in all three disciplines. The intersection of risk for safety and security is now being developed as there is a strong correlation between reactor design and operations and their vulnerability to sabotage. The intersection of risk for security and safeguards has to date chiefly been focused on the nuclear material control and accounting systems, which are relied on by both the operator (State) and the IAEA. This paper explores the concept of risk in each of the three disciplines, how they interact, potential conflicts and interfaces , how these might be addressed and leveraged, and a notional framework for how this could be achieved.

Kovacic, Donald N↗

DOE OSTI2024

Renewable Energy Potential Model: Priority Geothermal Leasing Areas ReEDs Results

This dataset contains the results of a study conducted by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) to identify potential future priority geothermal leasing areas on Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and United States Forest Service (USFS) lands. The analysis uses the Regional Energy Deployment System (ReEDS) model to evaluate geothermal resource potential under different scenarios of resource depth and technology combinations through the year 2050. The study considers geothermal resource potential, natural resource conflicts, and transmission access to categorize areas into near, mid, and far deployment priorities. The dataset includes outputs from the ReEDS model, such as geothermal capacity, generation, system costs, and emissions under various economic and technical scenarios. Favorability site data with geographic coordinates and site-specific attributes (e.g., resource favorability, land type) are also provided. Supporting resources include a technical report detailing methodologies and assumptions, along with a link to the ReEDS model GitHub repository, which requires GAMS and Python software for execution.

15 GEOTHERMAL ENERGY↗

DOE OSTI2021

High Miscibility Compatible with Ordered Molecular Packing Enables an Excellent Efficiency of 16.2% in All-Small-Molecule Organic Solar Cells

In all-small-molecule organic solar cells (ASM-OSCs), a high short-circuit current (Jsc) usually needs a small phase separation, while a high fill factor (FF) is generally realized in a highly ordered packing system. However, small domain and ordered packing always conflicted each other in ASM-OSCs, leading to a mutually restricted J sc and FF. Here, in this study, alleviation of the previous dilemma by the strategy of obtaining simultaneous good miscibility and ordered packing through modulating homo- and heteromolecular interactions is proposed. By moving the alkyl-thiolation side chains from the para- to the meta-position in the small-molecule donor, the surface tension and molecular planarity are synchronously enhanced, resulting in compatible properties of good miscibility with acceptor BTP-eC9 and strong self-assembly ability. As a result, an optimized morphology with multi-length-scale domains and highly ordered packing is realized. The device exhibits a long carrier lifetime (39.8 μs) and fast charge collection (15.5 ns). A record efficiency of 16.2% with a high FF of 75.6% and a J sc of 25.4 mA cm –2 in the ASM-OSCs is obtained. These results demonstrate that the strategy of simultaneously obtaining good miscibility with high crystallinity could be an efficient photovoltaic material design principle for high-performance ASM-OSCs.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗