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At least 19 records

PNNL’s Shared Perspectives Technology

Shared Perspectives, one of the technologies within the PNNL-developed GridOPTICS capability suite, enables neighboring organizations, such as different electric utilities, to more effectively partner to solve outages and other grid problems. Shared Perspectives provides a means for organizations to safely stream information from different organizational service areas; the technology then combines and aligns this information into a common, global view, enhancing global situation awareness that can reduce the time it takes to talk through a problem and identify solutions. The technology potentially offers applications in other areas, such as disaster response; collaboration in the monitoring/assessment of real-time events (e.g., hurricanes, earthquakes, and tornadoes); as well as military uses.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗

A Call for Collaboration among Water Quality and Fisheries Professionals

Poor water quality is one of the greatest threats to fish population recovery, fisheries, and aquaculture. There are examples of game fish species and species of conservation concern threatened by poor water quality conditions across North America (Warren and Burr 1994; Couillard et al. 2008). In the Missouri River–Fort Peck Reservoir, low dissolved oxygen limits Pallid Sturgeon Scaphirhynchus albus larvae survival (Guy et al. 2015). In the Pacific Northwest, increased temperatures reduce habitat for salmonids (Isaak and Rieman 2013). In the Northeast, acid deposition threatens populations of native Brook Trout Salvelinus fontinalis and endangered Atlantic Salmon Salmo salar (Parrish et al. 1998; Baldigo et al. 2007). The population of White Sturgeon Acipenser transmontanus in Brownlee Reservoir, Idaho, is one example of a species of conservation concern that has sufficient, otherwise suitable habitat, but has not recovered due to extended hypoxia resulting from agricultural runoff (Sullivan et al. 2003). Water quality can also be an issue for hatcheries and when introducing hatchery-raised fish into the wild. An estimated 200,000–300,000 fall Chinook Salmon Oncorhynchus tshawytscha smolts were killed in an incident at a California hatchery because debris from a spillway failure caused oxygen levels to drop (Cahill 2017). Recently, the Idaho Department of Fish and Game in collaboration with National Marine Fisheries Service researchers discovered that low survival of endangered, hatchery-reared Sockeye Salmon O. nerka smolts was the result of differences in water hardness between the hatchery and the release site (Trushenski et al. 2019). In each of these situations, desired fisheries goals cannot be achieved without addressing underlying water quality issues. It is readily apparent that fish must have clean water to survive and that when water quality is severely degraded, fish populations typically suffer. However, in some cases, a waterbody can be considered to have impaired water quality, yet be highly productive from a fisheries standpoint (see Stockner et al. 2000 and Anders and Ashley 2007 for further discussion of this topic). To ensure that protective water quality is maintained while fisheries are effectively managed, we believe that better collaboration is needed between fisheries and water quality professionals. In this perspective column, we make a case that these two groups of professionals can be more effective by working together and sharing perspectives. Here, we highlight the benefits of such partnerships and describe specific opportunities for strengthening collaboration. Finally, we highlight the role that the American Fisheries Society can play by facilitating collaboration through professional meetings and training.

60 APPLIED LIFE SCIENCES↗

Early Career Perspectives to Broaden the Scope of Critical Zone Science

Abstract Critical Zone (CZ) scientists have advanced understanding of Earth's surface through process‐based research that quantifies water, energy, and mass fluxes in predominantly undisturbed systems. However, the CZ is being increasingly altered by humans through climate and land use change. Expanding the scope of CZ science to include both human‐ and non‐human controls on the CZ is important for understanding anthropogenic impacts to Earth's surface processes and ecosystem services. Here, we share perspectives from predominantly U.S.‐based, early career CZ scientists centered around broadening the scope of CZ science to focus on societally relevant science through a transdisciplinary science framework. We call for increased training on transdisciplinary methods and collaboration opportunities across disciplines and with stakeholders to foster a scientific community that values transdisciplinary science alongside physical science. Here, we build on existing transdisciplinary research frameworks by highlighting the need for institutional support to include and educate graduate students throughout the research processes. We also call for graduate‐student‐led initiatives to increase their own exposure to transdisciplinary science through activities such as transdisciplinary‐focused seminars and symposiums, volunteering with local conservation groups, and participating in internships outside academia.

Warix, Sara [University of Utah Department of Geol↗

A “Floatilla” of Airborne Seismometers for Venus

Abstract Barometers floating on high‐altitude balloons in the relatively clement cloud layer on Venus could detect and characterize acoustic waves generated by seismic activity, avoiding the need for high‐temperature electronics required for surface seismology. Garcia et al. (2022, https://doi.org/10.1029/2022GL098844 ) recently demonstrated the detection of low‐frequency sound (infrasound) caused by earthquakes of magnitudes 7.3 and 7.5 from stratospheric balloons nearly 3,000 km away from the epicenter. They provided a preliminary demonstration of earthquake magnitude and location inversion, and the determination of S‐ and Rayleigh wave velocities using only their acoustic signature. Large earthquakes produce low‐frequency seismic waves that penetrate the interiors of planets; their detection at continental‐scale distances from a high‐vantage point demonstrates the feasibility of balloon‐based investigations of Venus' interior. We contextualize these results within the effort to perform seismology on Venus from balloons, discuss its limitations, and share perspectives on open research questions in this area.

Krishnamoorthy, Siddharth↗

Strategic Weapons in the 21st Century: Understanding the New U.S. Policy Context (Meeting Summary)

The annual Strategic Weapons in the 21st Century (SW21), co-hosted by Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories (LANL, LLNL), brought together a diverse group of about two hundred experts from the three United States nuclear weapons labs, U.S. federal government and military, think tanks, universities, and foreign partners to share perspectives on important issues in strategic deterrence. All remarks and discussion were on a non-attribution basis. The objectives of this year’s event were: To understand the new policies and approaches of the Trump administration; To understand areas of continuity and change with previous Nuclear Posture Reviews and the challenges of implementation; To better understand domestic and foreign reactions; To characterize and assess implications for the U.S. nuclear enterprise.

98 NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT, SAFEGUARDS, AND PHYSICAL P↗

Strategic Weapons in the 21st Century - The New Dynamics of Strategic Conflict and Competition

The 12th annual Strategic Weapons in the 21st Century (SW21) workshop aimed to sustain high-level focus on key deterrence challenges and to promote well-informed discussion of them on a non-partisan basis. It brought together interested stakeholders from the national security laboratories, federal government, military, think tank, and academic communities, as well as allied counterparts, to share perspectives in an unclassified setting. The agenda was designed to examine the following key questions: How is the problem of strategic conflict changing, and why? How is the problem of strategic rivalry shaping up? How do adversaries think about and prepare for conflict and competition with the United States? What should the United States and its allies do to safeguard their interests?

98 NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT, SAFEGUARDS, AND PHYSICAL P↗

Strategic Weapons in the 21st Century The U.S. Nuclear Deterrent in 2030 and Beyond: Fit for Purpose?

The 13th annual Strategic Weapons in the 21st Century (SW21) workshop brought together a mixture of senior officials from the laboratory, policy, military, and expert communities to promote a high-level focus and well-informed discussion on key deterrence challenges for the U.S. nuclear deterrent over the coming decade and beyond. It brought together interested stakeholders from the national security laboratories, federal government, military, think tank, and academic communities, as well as allied counterparts, to share perspectives in an unclassified setting.

45 MILITARY TECHNOLOGY, WEAPONRY, AND NATIONAL DEF↗

Workshop on Sustainable Aviation Fuel-Use Research Opportunities

On February 15-16, 2022, the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Vehicle Technology Office (VTO) within Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) convened a workshop to assess the end-use research opportunities for Sustainable Aviation Fuels (SAF). This report summarizes the proceedings and findings of the workshop, which the U.S. Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory hosted as a virtual event. During these two half-days, invited members of national laboratories, industry, government, and academia connected virtually to share perspectives on SAF research needs for improving end-use adoption.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗

Workshop Report: Rural Electric Cooperative Distributed Energy Resource Business Model Development Workshops

The United States' energy future is being shaped by decades of technology innovation, rapidly changing consumer requirements, and governmental focus on securing reliable, low-cost energy sources. With expanded electrification and increased emphasis on grid reliability coupled with the heightened complexity and risks associated with transmission infrastructure, the use of distributed energy resources (DERs) is more commonly being considered a safe, efficient, and cost-effective way to maintain grid resilience and reliability. Amidst improvements in performance, decreasing costs, and unprecedented federal policy support for DERs, electric cooperatives are considering new opportunities to use these assets to ensure secure and reliable operations for millions of customers. In light of these developments, a series of workshops were held to collaborate on the development of business models for DERs in rural electric cooperative ecosystems. The first workshop was held July 11, 2024, at the Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association Inc. headquarters in Westminster, Colorado (hereafter referred to as the "Tri-State Workshop"). The second workshop was hosted by PNGC Power on Oct. 9, 2024, in Portland, Oregon (hereafter referred to as the "PNGC Power Workshop"). These workshops convened representatives from G&Ts, distribution cooperatives,2 the energy industry, the financial community, the U.S. government, national and regional organizations, and national laboratories to share perspectives on the unique needs, challenges, and opportunities that they face as DERs are further integrated into the grid. The workshops were designed to address the following objectives: (1) develop the enabling attributes of electric cooperative DER business models, (2) explore pathways for generating community benefits from these assets, and (3) identify technical challenges and market risks for DERs in rural electric cooperative service territories. This report outlines key findings and major themes identified by workshop participants that federal agencies, G&Ts, distribution cooperatives, and other entities can consider to advance electric cooperative DER business models.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗

Electricity Rate Designs for Large Loads: Evolving Practices and Opportunities 2026 Update

Electricity demand from large-load customers such as data centers is projected to grow significantly in the near term. While these large loads play an important role in advancing technology innovation and economic growth in the United States, meeting their energy needs requires utilities and regulators to consider important operational and financial risks, such as insufficient energy supply or underutilized investments, that can impact all customers. This paper builds on similar research published in January 2025, providing an overview of how utilities and regulators are managing these risks through different tariffs, including rate structures and electric service agreements. Regulators, utilities, customers, and other stakeholders can use this paper as a foundation when discussing issues and sharing perspectives on developing or reviewing large-load tariffs.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗

New challenges in oxygen reduction catalysis: a consortium retrospective to inform future research

In this perspective, we highlight results of a research consortium devoted to advancing understanding of oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) catalysis as a means to inform fuel cell science. We demonstrate how targeted collaborations between different institutions from academic, national lab, and industry backgrounds and different scientific disciplines like theory, experiment, and characterization can yield unique insights into fuel cell catalysts. We comment on such insights into material designs for platinum-group-metal alloys, transition metal oxides, and non-traditional materials including metal–organic frameworks; systems that have served as the foundational building blocks for our consortium. We also motivate a renewed focus on catalyst durability in light of emerging technological requirements and paths forward in understanding in situ and operando electrochemical stability. Lastly, we describe new frontiers ORR research can take and how emerging artificial intelligence tools can assist researchers in capturing data, selecting new experiments, and guiding characterization to accelerate the design and discovery of fuel cell catalysts. A main goal of sharing this perspective is to discuss the rationale for our future research plans based on our consortium work. However, we also hope to illustrate both the potential impact of a collaborative strategy with the hopes of inspiring a higher degree of Industry-Academia-National Laboratory collaboration and encourage other centers and consortiums to distill and share their findings in a similar perspective-type article. Together we hope to enable the fuel cell research community to engage in a discussion of strategies for research and accelerated development of catalysts with improved activity and stability.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗

Rural Hybrid Generation & Microgrids: National Labs are Here to Help

Hear about the tools and technical assistance National Labs can offer to co-ops and other rural utilities seeking to build or enhance hybrid generation projects combining multiple technologies including wind, solar, battery storage, and others resources. These hybrids can deliver additional value by combining complimentary resources and by increasing reliability and resilience, including as part of a microgrid to serve a local load or community. Experienced cooperative and lab experts will share their perspectives on the opportunities there are to make use of their advanced modeling capabilities and expertise to scope, design, and implement these emerging hybrid solutions. Key takeaways for participants will include better understanding of the resilience benefits distributed hybrid systems provide, awareness of National Laboratory assistance programs and resources, tips for successful federal funding applications for these types of projects, and peer-to-peer learning through shared experiences and discussion.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗

Ecosystems for Scientific Computing in the Age of AI

Scientific computing is at an inflection point. Artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping how scientific software is developed, how teams collaborate, how projects are governed, and how the next generation is trained. Drawing on insights from a 2025 workshop report, this article argues that the future of discovery will depend on agile, robust ecosystems built through socio-technical co-design—the intentional integration of technical and human systems. This perspective is essential for ensuring that future scientific computing remains trustworthy, sustainable, and scalable. It combines advances in AI, high-performance computing, and software with new models for cross-disciplinary collaboration, education, and workforce development. Key recommendations include building modular, trustworthy AI-enabled software ecosystems; enabling teams to integrate AI into scientific workflows while preserving human creativity, integrity, and rigor; and developing adaptive training pathways that keep pace with rapid technological change. By sharing these perspectives, we hope to stimulate broader community dialogue and encourage coordinated action.

AI↗

Electricity Rate Designs for Large Loads: Evolving Practices and Opportunities

Electricity demand from large load customers such as data centers is projected to grow significantly in the near term. While data centers play an important role in advancing technology innovation and economic growth in the United States, data center energy needs present challenges and opportunities for electricity supply and infrastructure. This technical brief serves as a foundation for the discussion of issues and sharing of perspectives among utilities, regulators, large load customers, and other stakeholders. As utilities and regulators explore rate structures to address growing data center electricity demand, several issues have emerged: -Fair allocation of electricity system costs to large-load customers without unfair shifting of costs to other customers -Appropriate mitigation of the financial risks associated with stranded assets from underutilized utility system investments -Mitigation of operational and resource adequacy risks if electricity demand exceeds supply -Appropriate risk-sharing in commercializing newer electricity technologies such as advanced geothermal, small modular reactors, and long duration energy storage -Accommodating the diverse needs of large-load customers, such as having the option to match electricity consumption with output from carbon-free resources or using onsite generation to provide system capacity The technical brief also identifies key design elements that aim to address these issues and uses leading examples from pending and approved rate structures, agreements, and special contracts to ground the elements in practice.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗

Advanced Nanocarbons for Enhanced Performance and Durability of Platinum Catalysts in Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cells

Insufficient stability of current carbon supported Pt and Pt alloy catalysts is a significant barrier for proton-exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs). As a primary degradation cause to trigger Pt nanoparticle migration, dissolution, and aggregation, carbon corrosion remains a significant challenge. Compared with enhancing Pt and PtM alloy particle stability, improving support stability is rather challenging due to carbon's thermodynamic instability under fuel cell operation. In recent years, significant efforts have been made to develop highly durable carbon-based supports concerning innovative nanostructure design and synthesis along with mechanistic understanding. Here, this review critically discusses recent progress in developing carbon-based materials for Pt catalysts and provides synthesis–structure–performance correlations to elucidate underlying stability enhancement mechanisms. The mechanisms and impacts of carbon support degradation on Pt catalyst performance are first discussed. The general strategies are summarized to tailor the carbon structures and strengthen the metal–support interactions, followed by discussions on how these designs lead to enhanced support stability. Based on current experimental and theoretical studies, the critical features of carbon supports are analyzed concerning their impacts on the performance and durability of Pt catalysts in fuel cells. Finally, the perspectives are shared on future directions to develop advanced carbon materials with favorable morphologies and nanostructures to increase Pt utilization, strengthen metal-support interactions, facilitate mass/charge transfer, and enhance corrosion resistance.

25 ENERGY STORAGE↗

A Brief Account of Steven Weinberg’s Legacy in ab initio Many-Body Theory

In this contribution to the special issue “Celebrating 30 years of Steven Weinberg’s papers on Nuclear Forces from Chiral Lagrangians,” we emphasize the important role chiral effective field theory has played in leading nuclear physics into a precision era. To this end, we share our perspective on a few of the recent advances made in ab initio calculations of nuclear structure and nuclear matter observables, as well as Bayesian uncertainty quantification of effective field theory truncation errors.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗