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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.

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At least 1,135 records · Page 63
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2023

Distributed Ledger Technology for Fault Tolerant Distribution Grid Operations

This paper explores the potential of distributed ledger technology (DLT) to improve fault-tolerant grid operations by leveraging its core features as an immutable, decentralized ledger, a distributed, consensus-based agreement process, and a distributed state-replication engine. Distribution power systems deliver electricity to millions of customers; however, they are susceptible to various threats that can result in customer interruptions. These include faults caused by adverse weather conditions, natural disasters, vegetation growth, equipment failure, and malicious attacks. To minimize the effects of these faults, fault-handling approaches rely on network knowledge to isolate affected areas and reconnect unaffected areas, reducing the number of affected customers while maintaining safety. Here, we present a trusted data-sharing architecture that enables independent, distributed actors to reconstruct the pre-fault system state by enabling distributed resources to make appropriate decisions with limited network/system information. Although the process requires some data sharing between switch-delimited areas, the approach limits the amount of private information shared, preserving customers' privacy and business-sensitive information. We include three use cases that form a foundation for third parties to develop functional solutions that can eventually be deployed in the field. The gross error detection method used within switch-delimited areas can identify sensor errors and accurately detect circuit breaker states. The evaluation of possible reconnection while preserving data ownership resulted in a voltage magnitude difference smaller than 0.001% from the OpenDSS power flow solution that has full system knowledge, which is below the expected power flow tolerance. The approach offers a promising opportunity for improving fault-tolerant distribution grid operations.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗
DOE OSTI2021

Field-Array Benchmark of Commercial Bifacial PV Technologies with Publicly Available Data

We present results for a 75-kW field array deployed with rows of 5 different commercially available bifacial technologies. Four PERC (multi and mono) and 1 Silicon Heterojunction manufacturers are represented. Reference strings of equivalent monofacial PV modules are also installed in the 10-row field. High accuracy string-level DC monitoring and module-level measurements have been recorded for six months. Analysis indicates performance within expectation, with a cumulative model mean error within +/- 2% for both bifacial and monofacial models and cumulative bifacial energy gain between 6-9%. A custom-module to measure shading loss from the torque-tube was installed. One month data shows up to 6% irradiance non-uniformity. A fixed-tilt test-site with 3 years of bifacial data is also presented, with a bifacial gain of 3%.

41 EE - Solar Energy Technologies Office (EE-4S)↗
DOE OSTI2022

Structural variant analysis of a cancer reference cell line sample using multiple sequencing technologies

The cancer genome is commonly altered with thousands of structural rearrangements including insertions, deletions, translocation, inversions, duplications, and copy number variations. Thus, structural variant (SV) characterization plays a paramount role in cancer target identification, oncology diagnostics, and personalized medicine. As part of the SEQC2 Consortium effort, the present study established and evaluated a consensus SV call set using a breast cancer reference cell line and matched normal control derived from the same donor, which were used in our companion benchmarking studies as reference samples. We systematically investigated somatic SVs in the reference cancer cell line by comparing to a matched normal cell line using multiple NGS platforms including Illumina short-read, 10X Genomics linked reads, PacBio long reads, Oxford Nanopore long reads, and high-throughput chromosome conformation capture (Hi-C). We established a consensus SV call set of a total of 1788 SVs including 717 deletions, 230 duplications, 551 insertions, 133 inversions, 146 translocations, and 11 breakends for the reference cancer cell line. To independently evaluate and cross-validate the accuracy of our consensus SV call set, we used orthogonal methods including PCR-based validation, Affymetrix arrays, Bionano optical mapping, and identification of fusion genes detected from RNA-seq. We evaluated the strengths and weaknesses of each NGS technology for SV determination, and our findings provide an actionable guide to improve cancer genome SV detection sensitivity and accuracy. A high-confidence consensus SV call set was established for the reference cancer cell line. A large subset of the variants identified was validated by multiple orthogonal methods.

59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2023

Utah FORGE: Sanvean Technologies Drilling Data from Well 16B(78)-32

Included here is Sanvean Technologies bit sensor data amalgamated with data from National Oilwell Varco's (NOV) BlackBox tool for Reed Hycalog bits used during drilling of Well 16B(78)-32. The dataset contains information collected at the bit while drilling including rate of penetration (ROP), top drive torque, and bit box temperature. The data was recorded at the bit box and top sub of the motor. RPM was measured by onboard gyro recording continuously in each sensor, and shock levels were also recorded on X, Y and Z axis. This data was merged with EDR in time format and saved in file sets (the zipped files) then output into CSV files. Please note: fields in the CSV files, such as the date field, may need to be formatted to display properly. There is an additional zipped folder in each dataset that is password protected. Sanvean GameChanger Viewer software must be used to view this password protected data. Information on how to use and download this free software is also included here.

15 GEOTHERMAL ENERGY↗
DOE OSTI2022

Strengthening the Security of Operational Technology: Understanding Contemporary Bill of Materials

The evolution of cyber-physical infrastructure has made its security more challenging. The last few years have witnessed a convergence of hardware and software segments in various domains, including operational technology (OT) which is responsible for carrying out critical tasks such as monitoring and controlling power grids, nuclear plants, transportation, and emergency services. Both hardware and software encapsulate numerous open source and proprietary subcomponents, making it crucial for end-users to understand the composition of the products they are using. For example, wind turbines incorporate thousands of lines of code (software) used for the turbine's design, planning, operation, and analytics in addition to the numerous hardware subcomponents that construct it. Due to the highly complex nature of software and hardware, knowledge of the components and subcomponents is required to mitigate cyber vulnerabilities and defend against cyberattacks. There has also been a transformation from a traditional linear supply chain into a global, dynamic, diverse, and interconnected system. The digitization of the supply chain makes it easier to find and exploit vulnerabilities. Critical infrastructures (e.g., power grids, oil, natural gas, water, and wastewater) rely on OT to function, and if the OT is compromised, equipment damage and potential interruption of services could result. A significant security measure to protect OT systems from disruption is to develop a supply chain bill of materials (BoM) corresponding to the software and hardware used in OT, along with attestations amongst vendors and asset owners. A supply chain BoM is a proactive way to understand the inherent vulnerabilities in the system and mitigate them in advance of being exploited. BoMs bolster the trust placed in the digital infrastructure and enhance software supply chain security by sustaining the management of component obsolescence and compliance, along with the seclusion of unsafe segments of a specific product. Adopting BoM tools is becoming increasingly important across various government sectors, as evidenced by the recent U.S. executive order on cybersecurity (NIST 2021). This paper aims to classify BoMs based on structure, functionality, component type, and architecture. The work also discusses case studies to further highlight the benefits of BoMs. In addition, it identifies missing pieces in existing BoM implementations so that future research may identify bounds on where it could expect to make improvements and directly enable researchers to identify promising areas for exploration. Further, the authors provide valuable recommendations to tool developers, researchers, and standardizing organizations (policymakers), additionally benefitting critical infrastructure owners and government executives. This aids in paving a path for future work, thereby, providing suggestions to determine a tool for consumers that best suit their needs.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2020

The Contact Stress Sensor _ Proposal to the FY2020 Technology Tech Mat Grants Program

The technology to be advanced is a very small and thin Contact Stress Sensor (CSS) that measures the contact stress between two contacting surfaces. It will be used to monitor the internal condition of a weapon in the stockpile over periods of decades. Monitoring the load path of a complex weapon assembly offers an important verification of the weapon’s mechanical state in both quasi-static or dynamic environments. Concurrently, the sensor can be used to measure temperature. This is useful for sensor calibration while installed in a system, as well as thermal monitoring in regions of the system that are difficult to access. Thus, the CSS is one way to monitor the internal “health” of a weapon. A sensor is shown below with each sensor being less then 2mm in width and 125 microns in thickness.

45 MILITARY TECHNOLOGY, WEAPONRY, AND NATIONAL DEF↗
DOE OSTI2020

Biochemical Conversion of Lignocellulosic Biomass to Hydrocarbon Fuels and Products: 2019 State of Technology and Future Research

The purpose of this report is to benchmark the latest experimental developments across a number of potential bioconversion pathways as quantified by modeled minimum fuel selling prices (MFSPs), as a measure of current status relative to those final targets. For this state of technology, TEA models were run for two separate biological conversion pathways to fuels, based on available data for integrated biomass deconstruction and hydrolysate processing; namely carboxylic acids (primarily butyric acid) and diols (2,3-butanediol [BDO]), reflecting NREL’s recently-published 2018 biochemical design report focused on those two pathways. The models were run across three scenarios for lignin utilization, namely combustion, conversion to coproducts based on “base case” performance with biomass hydrolysate, and conversion to coproducts based on “high” performance demonstrated with model lignin monomer components.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2020

High-Octane Gasoline from Lignocellulosic Biomass via Syngas and Methanol/Dimethyl Ether Intermediates: 2019 State of Technology

The report focuses on 2019 state of technology (SOT) updates to a 2018 SOT report, which presented research and techno-economic analysis updates of the detailed 2015 design report, along with sensitivity analysis showing the effect of key assumptions and parameters. Relevant developments in 2019 are presented here without repeating the bulk of the material included in the previous reports. The conversion pathway presented in this report includes the gasification of biomass, steam reforming and cleanup of the syngas, followed by the conversion of the syngas to high-octane gasoline (HOG) via methanol and dimethyl-ether (DME) intermediates. Key achievements in 2019 for the DME-to-HOG conversion step include increased DME conversion, while maintaining selectivity towards desirable C5+ hydrocarbon products, reduced aromatics formation, and an increased conversion of co-fed C4 to C5+ (in experiments conducted to simulate the recycle of C4 products).

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2021

Effect of Hyperloop Technologies on the Electric Grid and Transportation Energy

Hyperloop technology, initially proposed in 2013 as an innovative means for intermediate range or intercity travel, is now being developed by several companies. Proponents point to potential benefits for both passenger travel and freight transport, including time-savings, convenience, quality of service and, in some cases, increased energy efficiency. Because the system is powered by electricity, its interface with the grid may require strategies that include energy storage. The added infrastructure, in some cases, may present opportunities for gridwide system benefits from integrating hyperloop systems with variable energy resources.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗
DOE OSTI2021

High-Octane Gasoline from Lignocellulosic Biomass via Syngas and Methanol/Dimethyl Ether Intermediates: 2020 State of Technology

The 2020 state of technology (SOT) serves as an update to the 2019 SOT report and details the techno-economic analysis (TEA) results for producing high-octane gasoline (HOG) via indirect liquefaction (IDL). This report only describes changes to the experimental and analysis results from previous SOTs; more details regarding the full process design can be found in the 2015 design report. The conversion pathway presented in this report includes the gasification of biomass, steam reforming and cleanup of the syngas, followed by the conversion of the syngas to HOG via methanol and dimethyl-ether (DME) intermediates. Research efforts in 2020 included the collection of experimental results over a variety of isobutane (iC4) to DME ratios in the feed of the DME-to-HOG reactor, enabling the TEA to identify the effect on modeled product yield and cost. Additionally, a significant re-build of the Aspen Plus model allowed for better integration of new research, however underlying conceptual and economic assumptions remain the same as those detailed in the 2015 deign report. The 2020 SOT also considers the potential for federal carbon tax credits from CO 2 capture in the acid-gas removal step and the impact on the final minimum fuel selling price.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2021

Introduction to the Consortium for Monitoring, Technology, and Verification (MTV) [Slides]

Our mission is to develop new technologies that detect and deter nuclear proliferation activities while training the next generation of nuclear professionals. The three technical thrust areas are: 1. Fundamentals of nuclear and particle physics, 2. Signals and source terms for nuclear nonproliferation, and 3. Nuclear explosion. There are opportunities for collaborations with university faculty, possible student and post-doc work, and posting job ads. Further, MTV hosts various workshops, symposiums.

45 MILITARY TECHNOLOGY, WEAPONRY, AND NATIONAL DEF↗
DOE OSTI2021

Managing Cyber Supply Chain Risk for Renewable Energy Technologies

On July 1, 2021, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Cybersecurity, Energy Security, and Emergency Response (CESER) hosted a virtual workshop facilitated by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). Cybersecurity supply chain experts, researchers, and leaders in government and industry came together to share information on current and future challenges in securing emerging technologies and technical architecture. From a cybersecurity perspective, we need to move from a cybersecurity approach that focuses principally on legacy asset owners to one that incorporates more emphasis on end-point device manufacturers and third-party integrators. Cybersecurity for the global digital supply chain for manufacturers of consumer end-point devices—such as smart solar inverters and smart electric vehicle (EV) chargers—will be critical to the future cyber health of the grid.

29 ENERGY PLANNING, POLICY, AND ECONOMY↗
DOE OSTI2021

Comparative Assessment of Data-driven Process Models in Health Information Technology

Process mining for conformance analysis consists of comparing a reference process model against a data-driven process model generated via log files from information technology systems. However, in the absence of a complete reference process model, we found no suggested approaches in the literature to address the need for evaluating process conformance among different healthcare facilities to assess standardization of care. Our goal is to find similarities and dissimilarities in data-driven process models among US Veterans Health Administration (VHA) facilities that can be indicative of patient safety issues. Our hypothesis was that the analysis would not produce statistically significant differences in outcome. We present a unique implementation of conformance analysis in process mining that consists of combining process mining, process mapping and statistical metrics. We illustrate our approach by applying it to the analysis of two clinical radiology order process models generated from healthcare data provided by two similar facilities in the VHA. The comparative assessment showed that about 70% of the orders completed successfully and 30% were not completed due to policy and duplications. Our analysis found a good statistical correlation between both facilities, as the Spearman’s correlation coefficient between facilities for the frequency of cases per total hours was 0.87879, for the frequency of cases by state transition was 0.79702 and for the throughput time per state transition was 0.63582. Additional statistical analyses using the Mann-Whitney U test and the root mean square error both produced values that were not significant. The foregoing approach validated our hypothesis by demonstrating a good statistical correlation of data describing the flow of clinical radiology orders absent a credible reference model. Finding good agreement between both facilities was important in confirming that the clinical orders flow in a similar manner, suggesting standardization of care.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2021

Future Automotive Systems Technology Simulator (FASTSim) Validation Report - 2021

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory's Future Automotive Systems Technology Simulator (FASTSim) captures the most important factors influencing vehicle power demands and performs large-scale fuel efficiency calculations very quickly. These features make FASTSim well suited to evaluate a representative distribution of real-world fuel efficiency over a large quantity of in-use driving profiles, which have become increasingly available in recent years owing to incorporation of Global Positioning System data collection into various travel surveys and studies. In addition, by being open source, computationally lightweight, freely available, and free from expensive third-party software requirements, analyses conducted using FASTSim may be easily replicated and critiqued in an open forum. This is highly desirable for situations in which technical experts seek to reach consensus over questions about what vehicle development plans or public interest strategies could maximize fuel savings and minimize adverse environmental impacts with an evolving vehicle fleet. While FASTSim continues to be refined and improved on an ongoing basis, this report compiles available runs using versions of the tool from the past few years to provide illustrative comparisons of the model results against measured data.

33 ADVANCED PROPULSION SYSTEMS↗
DOE OSTI2022

High-Octane Gasoline from Lignocellulosic Biomass via Syngas and Methanol/Dimethyl Ether Intermediates (2021 State of Technology)

The 2021 state of technology (SOT) assessment for the indirect liquefaction (IDL) of lignocellulosic biomass to high-octane gasoline (HOG) via methanol and dimethyl ether (DME) intermediates details the techno-economic analysis (TEA) results and technical progress of the pathway since the 2020 SOT report. A detailed process description and collection of underlying assumptions is given the 2015 design report. In 2021, research efforts rigorously quantified the selectivity of DME to aromatic compounds. As a result, the overall carbon selectivity to hydrocarbon products was updated based upon new findings. Additionally, research conducted over the past few years resulted in successful lower temperature regeneration of NREL's Cu/BEA catalyst with favorable implications on catalyst longevity. Discussions with an engineering firm resulted in an update to the excess air requirement for process combustors (including the char combustor, tar reformer combustor, and catalyst regenerator) in which excess air was reduced from 20% excess to 10%. The cumulative effect of the above efforts was used to calculate a minimum fuel selling price for the modeled pathway. Sensitivity cases examining federal carbon tax credits from CO 2 capture, product selectivity and yield, catalyst lifetime, and other key financial and process parameters were also considered in this assessment.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2022

Nuclear decisionmaking, complexity and emerging and disruptive technologies: A comprehensive assessment

The complex interactions of emerging and disruptive technologies (EDTs) could significantly impact nuclear decision-making, particular in an escalating regional conventional conflict. Such conflicts may present governments with a range of nuclear decisions: whether to introduce a nuclear dimension to a crisis, whether to cross the nuclear threshold through limited nuclear use, how to respond to a limited nuclear attack, whether to expand the scope and intensity of initial limited attacks, and whether to escalate to an all-out nuclear war. At each decision point, EDTs create potential risks as well as rewards. EDTs are likely to influence the context for nuclear decision-making and the choices between different courses of action. EDTs could impact the context of nuclear decision-making by improving or degrading situational assessment, the ability to deliberate, and the ability to manage one’s nuclear forces. EDTs could influence the choice between nuclear restraint or escalation by affecting the perceived strategic benefits, escalatory risks, and operational requirements associated with different courses of action. Even though particular combinations of EDTs could precipitate nuclear use in some scenarios, they could encourage restraint in others. The impact and relevance of the same combinations of EDTs might be different at various nuclear decision points. The availability of specific combinations of EDTs at different stages of a conflict would also vary because of the attrition and one-time-use nature of some capabilities. In later stages of a conflict, the decision maker’s confidence in different combinations of EDTs would depend on their previous experience in using them. While the interactions of EDTs are likely to bring additional complexity to a nuclear decision-making process, EDTs are also not the only source of complexity. Broader strategic, military, operational, legal, moral, and emotional factors are also likely to play an important role. These factors may dominate decision-making in a range of potential cases.

45 MILITARY TECHNOLOGY, WEAPONRY, AND NATIONAL DEF↗
DOE OSTI2022

Options for Subscale Maturation of Advanced Reactor Technologies Testing for Nuclear Thermal Propulsion

Several options could be implemented to establish an irradiation testing capability suitable for investigation of the performance of multiple nuclear thermal propulsion fuel elements at prototypic conditions. The prototypic conditions of interest are based on the current needs of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s Space Nuclear Power Program. The results of such testing are also intended to reduce the risks currently seen for any future subscale or full-scale ground testing of an engine-reactor system. The optimal solution is dependent upon several factors such as performance, cost, availability, schedule, technology readiness level, and plans for future testing in the SNP Program. Three options, based on different combinations of these factors, are considered in this report.

33 ADVANCED PROPULSION SYSTEMS↗