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Performance monitoring of Recovery Act projects within EERE has been an ongoing effort. Project recipients have been reporting technical and financial progress to project officers on a quarterly basis.
Senior Advisor to the Secretary for Recovery Act Implementation Matt Rogers shares his thoughts as the Recovery Act reaches a critical milestone -- the end of the 2010 fiscal year and the last day to obligation contract and grant funding under the Recovery Act. For more information about the Recovery Act at the Department of Energy: http://www.energy.gov/recovery Follow the Department of Energy! http://facebook.com/energygov http://twitter.com/energy
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This fact sheets provides an overview for EERE's Recovery Act project monitoring plans and activities for FY2010 and FY2011.
The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Recovery Act) provided more than $36 billion to the Department of Energy (DOE) to accelerate work on existing projects, undertake new and transformative research, and deploy clean energy technologies across the nation. Of this funding, $1029 million is supporting innovative work to advance biomass research, development, demonstration, and deployment.
Science Goals for the ARM Recovery Act Radars. In October 2008, an ARM workshop brought together approximately 30 climate research scientists to discuss the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Climate Research Facility's role in solving outstanding climate science issues. Through this discussion it was noted that one of ARM's primary contributions is to provide detailed information about cloud profiles and their impact on radiative fluxes. This work supports cloud parameterization development and improved understanding of cloud processes necessary for that development. A critical part of this work is measuring microphysical properties (cloud ice and liquid water content, cloud particle sizes, shapes, and distribution). ARM measurements and research have long included an emphasis on obtaining the best possible microphysical parameters with the available instrumentation. At the time of the workshop, this research was reaching the point where additional reduction in uncertainties in these critical parameters required new instrumentation for applications such as specifying radiative heating profiles, measuring vertical velocities, and studying the convective triggering and evolution of three-dimensional (3D) cloud fields. ARM was already operating a subset of the necessary instrumentation to make some progress on these problems; each of the ARM sites included (and still includes) a cloud radar (operating at 35 or 94 GHz), a cloud lidar, and balloon-borne temperature and humidity sensors. However, these measurements were inadequate for determining detailed microphysical properties in most cases. Additional instrumentation needed to improve retrievals of microphysical processes includes radars at two additional frequencies for a total of three at a single site (35 GHz, 94 GHz, and a precipitation radar) and a Doppler lidar. Evolving to a multi-frequency scanning radar is a medium-term goal to bridge our understanding of two-dimensional (2D) retrievals to the 3D cloud field. These additional microphysical measurements would allow detailed cloud properties to be derived even in the presence of light precipitation. It is important to couple these detailed measurements of cloud microphysics to vertical motion on the cloud scale to couple microphysics with meteorological processes. Vertically pointing Doppler radars provide the vertical motion of cloud particles but, to separate particle motion from air motion, a wind profiler is required. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act provided the means to address these needs and implement a multi-frequency suite of radars, including scanning radars, at each of the ARM sites. In addition, Doppler lidars have been deployed at several sites. With these new measurement capabilities, ARM has the measurement capabilities to tackle the problems of improving microphysical profile descriptions and evaluating the relationship between our current narrow-field-of view, zenith perspective on clouds to a description of the full 3D cloud field and its temporal evolution.
The Recovery Act: Districtwide Geothermal Heating Conversion project performed by the Blaine County School District was part of a larger effort by the District to reduce operating costs, address deferred maintenance items, and to improve the learning environment of the students. This project evaluated three options for the ground source which were Open-Loop Extraction/Re-injection wells, Closed-Loop Vertical Boreholes, and Closed-Loop Horizontal Slinky approaches. In the end the Closed-Loop Horizontal Slinky approach had the lowest total cost of ownership but the majority of the sites associated with this project did not have enough available ground area to install the system so the second lowest option was used (Open-Loop). In addition to the ground source, this project looked at ways to retrofit existing HVAC systems with new high efficiency systems. The end result was the installation of distributed waterto- air heat pumps with water-to-water heat pumps installed to act as boilers/chillers for areas with a high ventilation demand such as they gymnasiums. A number of options were evaluated and the lowest total cost of ownership approach was implemented in the majority of the facilities. The facilities where the lowest total cost of ownership approaches was not selected were done to maintain consistency of the systems from facility to facility. This project had a number of other benefits to the Blaine County public. The project utilizes guaranteed energy savings to justify the levy funds expended. The project also developed an educational dashboard that can be used in the classrooms and to educate the community on the project and its performance. In addition, the majority of the installation work was performed by contractors local to Blaine County which acted as an economic stimulus to the area during a period of recession.
LEXINGTON, MA - At 1366 Technologies, Ely Sachs and Frank van Mierlo are using ARPA-E Recovery Act funding to dramatically reduce the costs of solar panel production. To read more about the project: http://arpa-e.energy.gov/FundedProjects.aspx#1366 To see more projects funded by the Recovery Act through ARPA-E: http://arpa-e.energy.gov/FundedProjects.aspx
This fact sheets highlights U.S. Department of Energy fuel cell projects funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Recovery Act). More than 1,000 fuel cell systems have been deployed through Recovery Act funding.
Hazardous Waste Management Act/Resource Conservation and Recovery Act Storage and Treatment Permit Reapplication for the Idaho National Laboratory Materials and Fuels Complex Hazardous Waste Management Act/Resource Conservation and Recovery Act Partial Permit, PER-116. This Permit Reapplication is required by the PER-116 Permit Conditions I.G. and I.H., and must be submitted to the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality in accordance with IDAPA 58.01.05.012 [40 CFR §§ 270.10 and 270.13 through 270.29].
Under Funding Opportunity Announcement Number: DE-FOA-0000120, Recovery Act: Hydroelectric Facility Modernization, Alcoa Power Generating Inc. (APGI), a fully owned subsidiary of Alcoa Inc., implemented major upgrades at its Cheoah hydroelectric facility near Robbinsville, North Carolina.
Cloud data centers are projected to be the fastest growing segment of the server market through 2015, according to IDC. Increasingly people and businesses rely on the Cloud to deliver digital content quickly and efficiently. Recovery Act funding from the Department of Energy has helped SeaMicro's technologies enhance the total cost of operation, performance and energy efficiency in large data center and Cloud environments. SeaMicro's innovative supercomputer fabric connects thousands of processor cores, memory, storage and input/output traffic. The company's fabric supports multiple processor instruction sets. Current systems featuring SeaMicro technology typically use one quarter the power and take one sixth the space of traditional servers with the same compute performance, yet deliver up to 12 times the bandwidth per core. Mozilla and eHarmony are two customers successfully using SeaMicro's technology. Numerous non-public customers have been successfully using the SeaMicro product in test and production facilities. As a result of the Recovery Act funding from the U.S. Department of Energy, more than 50 direct jobs were created at SeaMicro. To date, they primarily have been high-value, engineering jobs. Hardware, software and manufacturing engineering positions have been created, as well as sales and sales engineering. The positions have allowed SeaMicro to significantly accelerate engineering development and accelerate commercialization. As a result, commercialization and delivery to market are months ahead of initial schedule. Additional jobs were indirectly created through the development of the SeaMicro product. Through many years of research and hard work prior to receipt of public funding, SeaMicro was awarded 2 patents for its work. SeaMicro's product led the way for industry leaders to reconsider the market for low power servers and create new product lines. With valuable support of the U.S. Department of Energy and through SeaMicro's product, the market has been reshaped by the company's unique approach and ground breaking technology.
Since the spring of 2009, billions of federal dollars have been allocated to state and local governments as grants for energy efficiency and renewable energy projects and programs. The scale of this American Reinvestment and Recovery Act (ARRA) funding, focused on 'shovel-ready' projects to create and retain jobs, is unprecedented. Thousands of newly funded players - cities, counties, states, and tribes - and thousands of programs and projects are entering the existing landscape of energy efficiency programs for the first time or expanding their reach. The nation's experience base with energy efficiency is growing enormously, fed by federal dollars and driven by broader objectives than saving energy alone. State and local officials made countless choices in developing portfolios of ARRA-funded energy efficiency programs and deciding how their programs would relate to existing efficiency programs funded by utility customers. Those choices are worth examining as bellwethers of a future world where there may be multiple program administrators and funding sources in many states. What are the opportunities and challenges of this new environment? What short- and long-term impacts will this large, infusion of funds have on utility customer-funded programs; for example, on infrastructure for delivering energy efficiency services or on customer willingness to invest in energy efficiency? To what extent has the attribution of energy savings been a critical issue, especially where administrators of utility customer-funded energy efficiency programs have performance or shareholder incentives? Do the new ARRA-funded energy efficiency programs provide insights on roles or activities that are particularly well-suited to state and local program administrators vs. administrators or implementers of utility customer-funded programs? The answers could have important implications for the future of U.S. energy efficiency. This report focuses on a selected set of ARRA-funded energy efficiency programs administered by state energy offices: the State Energy Program (SEP) formula grants, the portion of Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant (EECBG) formula funds administered directly by states, and the State Energy Efficient Appliance Rebate Program (SEEARP). Since these ARRA programs devote significant monies to energy efficiency and serve similar markets as utility customer-funded programs, there are frequent interactions between programs. We exclude the DOE low-income weatherization program and EECBG funding awarded directly to the over 2,200 cities, counties and tribes from our study to keep its scope manageable. We summarize the energy efficiency program design and funding choices made by the 50 state energy offices, 5 territories and the District of Columbia. We then focus on the specific choices made in 12 case study states. These states were selected based on the level of utility customer program funding, diversity of program administrator models, and geographic diversity. Based on interviews with more than 80 energy efficiency actors in those 12 states, we draw observations about states strategies for use of Recovery Act funds. We examine interactions between ARRA programs and utility customer-funded energy efficiency programs in terms of program planning, program design and implementation, policy issues, and potential long-term impacts. We consider how the existing regulatory policy framework and energy efficiency programs in these 12 states may have impacted development of these selected ARRA programs. Finally, we summarize key trends and highlight issues that evaluators of these ARRA programs may want to examine in more depth in their process and impact evaluations.
The Department of Energy's Office of Environmental Management's (EM), Richland Operations Office (Richland), is responsible for disposing of the Hanford Site's (Hanford) transuranic (TRU) waste, including nearly 12,000 cubic meters of radioactive contact-handled TRU wastes. Prior to disposing of this waste at the Department's Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP), Richland must certify that it meets WIPP's waste acceptance criteria. To be certified, the waste must be characterized, screened for prohibited items, treated (if necessary) and placed into a satisfactory disposal container. In a February 2008 amendment to an existing Record of Decision (Decision), the Department announced its plan to ship up to 8,764 cubic meters of contact-handled TRU waste from Hanford and other waste generator sites to the Advanced Mixed Waste Treatment Project (AMWTP) at Idaho's National Laboratory (INL) for processing and certification prior to disposal at WIPP. The Department decided to maximize the use of the AMWTP's automated waste processing capabilities to compact and, thereby, reduce the volume of contact-handled TRU waste. Compaction reduces the number of shipments and permits WIPP to more efficiently use its limited TRU waste disposal capacity. The Decision noted that the use of AMWTP would avoid the time and expense of establishing a processing capability at other sites. In May 2009, EM allocated $229 million of American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Recovery Act) funds to support Hanford's Solid Waste Program, including Hanford's contact-handled TRU waste. Besides providing jobs, these funds were intended to accelerate cleanup in the short term. We initiated this audit to determine whether the Department was effectively using Recovery Act funds to accelerate processing of Hanford's contact-handled TRU waste. Relying on the availability of Recovery Act funds, the Department changed course and approved an alternative plan that could increase costs by about $25 million by processing Hanford TRU-waste on-site rather than at AMWTP. Further, under the newly adopted alternative approach, the Department would fail to achieve the previously anticipated reductions in volume associated with the use of existing AMWTP waste compaction capabilities.
Today Vice President Biden announced that the Weatherization Assistance Program has weatherized 200,000 homes under the Recovery Act. We're taking your questions and comments right now on weatherization. Join in the conversation! *Facebook -- http://www.facebook.com/energygov *Twitter -- http://www.twitter.com/energy
This Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) Facility Investigation (RFI) Report summarizes groundwater investigation activities performed between July 2020 and October 2023 at the False Cape Data Collection Annex (FCDC) (Solid Waste Management Unit [SWMU] 113) located at Kennedy Space Center, Florida. The purpose of the RFI is to characterize the nature and extent of volatile organic compound (VOC)-contaminated groundwater at FCDC; evaluate the fate and transport of VOC contamination; collect sufficient data to evaluate potential future requirements for the site, such as corrective measures, long term monitoring, or No Further Action; and conduct a human health preliminary risk evaluation (PRE) based on the groundwater data.
The award of American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funding came with an unprecedented request for transparency to showcase to the American public how the stimulus funding was being put to work to achieve the goals put forth by the U.S. Government. At the U.S. Department of Energy Hanford Site, this request manifested in a contract requirement to provide weekly narrative, photos and video to highlight Recovery Act-funded projects. For DOE contractor CH2M HILL Plateau Remediation Company (CH2M HILL), the largest recipient of Hanford's funding, the reporting mechanism evolved into a communications tool for documenting the highly technical cleanup, then effectively sharing that story with the DOE and its varying stakeholder audiences. The report set the groundwork for building a streaming narrative of week-by-week progress. With the end of the Recovery Act, CH2M HILL is applying lessons learned from this stringent, transparent reporting process to its long-term reporting and communications of the progress being made in nuclear decommissioning at Hanford. (authors)
This document, Y/TS-1015/R12, Resource Conservation and Recovery Act General Contingency Plan for Hazardous Waste Treatment, Storage, and Disposal Units at the Y-12 National Security Complex, is for reference purposes. It is a consolidation of the August 10, 2018, versions of Attachment 6, “Contingency Plan,” from Tennessee Hazardous Waste Management Permits TNHW-122 and TNHW-127. It is not intended to supersede any requirements in these permits and any differences are unintentional. The decision to implement this contingency plan, as part of the Emergency Plan, depends upon whether an imminent or actual incident involving a RCRA treatment, storage, or disposal unit could threaten human health or the environment.