Search NASA⌕ Search

SEARCH · Search NASA

Results for “Destination”

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.

Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.

228 records · Page 13
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2020

Panel Session 120: Roundtable: Waste Management - Energy Facilities Contractor Operating Group (EFCOG WM)

This Roundtable focused on the WM EFCOG working group as they met to discuss a variety of issues of importance to US DOE waste management operations. The purpose of the WM EFCOG is to seek out and promote the best management and operating practices, cost effective technologies and disposal options for all waste streams generated at US DOE facilities whether destined for US DOE or commercial facilities. Each site representative provided a radioactive waste management lessons learned briefing. Panelists with presentations: Savannah River Site (SRS) Solid Waste Program Update (Kerri Crawford); Idaho Clean-up Project Status (Frederick Hughes); West Valley Demonstration Project Update - EFCOG Waste Management Working Group (John Rendall); Key Project Challenges and Successes (Kalli Shupe); EFCOG WMWG Challenging Waste Subgroup Update (Tammy Monday); CH TRU Difficult Waste Stream Processing Challenges (Daniel Pancake); Argonne Building 350 Clean-up Success Using Effective Work Control (Daniel Dilday); Problematic Waste Streams on the Oak Ridge Reservation (John Wrapp)

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE W↗
DOE OSTI2020

Autonomous Navigation and Control of UGVs' in Nuclear Power Plants - 20381

The purpose of the husky A200 ground robot is to autonomously navigate through the places where it is very hazardous for human beings to reach and operate, like nuclear power plants, chemical industries. The aim is to navigate the ground robot autonomously with an Arm mounted on the robot along with the different sensors as camera, and Lidar. The autonomous motion of the robot is controlled by the controller which uses path planner for trajectory generation of the robot. The mission planner uses the current position of the husky A200, given the way points of the initial and the destination it would extract a best possible route based on the current events provided using GMapping. The global reference frame is used for planning the way points. Creating the appropriate path and the actions required to follow the path are given by the motion planner. The motion planner depends on the active sensor data such as obstacles, lanes, based on the sensor data feasible path is generated. Feasibility of the path is determined by the dynamics of the husky and a series of points generated with certain velocity and acceleration profile. The controller adjusts the lateral, longitudinal and yaw motion of the husky to command the behaviors. The kinematic model is developed for kinematic motion of the husky and the dynamic model is developed for transient and steady state characteristics. The images and other type of data captured by the camera are processed through the computational framework used to build machine learning models. TensorFlow will be used for deep learning and to identify and classify different objects around the husky. (authors)

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE W↗
DOE OSTI2020

Applications of Hyporheic Zone Sampling for Assessing VOC Plume Engineered Remediation and Natural Attenuation Effectiveness - 20414

Determining the efficacy of engineered remedial actions and/or natural attenuation as an acceptable EPA Record of Decision (ROD) must address long-term temporal and spatial variability. Since final plume downslope destinations are aquifers and related surface streams and rivers, hyporheic zone sampling is essential. Comprehensive hyporheic sampling documents plume groundwater remediation prior to upwelling into stream benthic strata and natural attenuation within this dynamic zone itself. Our intensive sampling of the Savannah River Site (SRS) Chemical, Metals, and Pesticides (CMP) Pits VOC plume-fringe from 2005 to 2018 documented PCE natural attenuation and effectiveness of In Situ Thermal Treatment (ISTT). Most plume hyporheic upwelling was delimited to a 20 m inflow reach along Pen Branch. Our study utilized corroborative sampling methodologies: ambient hole-water grab samples: passive diffusion bags (PDB); and hole-core sediment samples to confirm station to station spatial and temporal trends. VOC hot spot detections were confirmed from both groundwater and soil core samples. VOC pathways through the Pen Branch hyporheic zone were assessed at hole-installation using sequential soil samples from augered cores and grab-samples of hole-bottom water. Longer term, composite water samples were collected from PDBs deployed for a minimum two-week equilibration period. Soil samples were collected from the 15 and 65 cm core levels in December 2017 and June 2018 at six stations. Additional core depths of 40 and 85 cm were sampled in June 2018 at the highest VOC station (5DB80). All samples were analyzed in an EPA certified lab by purge and trap GC-MS. Effectiveness of previous ISTT and soil vapor extraction (SVE) for this CMP Pits PCE plume, was clearly documented by significant downward trends in VOC at hyporheic zone stations prior to December 2015. Achieving final stage conversions of PCE daughter products to ethene and CO{sub 2} may be limited depending upon suitable interactions between hyporheic zone sediment morphology, hydrology, and redox conditions. Because declines in VOC daughter products at our hyporheic stations may also be caused by physical actions of dilution and dispersion rather than true biochemical dechlorination, full quantification of natural attenuation requires the use of compound-specific isotope ratio analysis (CSIA) and microbial 16S rRNA with qPCR. To assist these next-phase efforts, a natural attenuation index (NAI) was used to help produce quicker, more cost-effective decision making for locating CSIA and microbial sampling efforts. The NAI used natural logarithm transformed GC-MS results for station VOC degradation compounds versus VOC parent compounds. Wide differences were observed between stations. (authors)

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE W↗
DOE OSTI2024

Challenges in Tracking Waste Reduction Performance Improvement in Manufacturing Plants

The recently released Circularity Gap Report 2023 by Circle Economy Foundation found that the circularity score for the global economy is declining. This indicates that material extraction from virgin sources is climbing over earlier years. As per data released by US Geological Survey, material use in the US economy has increased exponentially with the expanding US economy over last century. EPA tracked municipal solid waste from 1960 to 2018 and found that 50% of the waste is destined for landfills. EPA estimates that US industry is responsible for 2.7 billion ton of solid non-hazardous waste annually in our mostly linear economy model. The circular economy framework aims at decoupling economic value generation from virgin materials extraction from nature. The linear model of material extraction and disposal at end of life is highly unsustainable. Manufacturing companies have realized this and in their commitments to sustainability are adopting ambitious waste reduction targets. Through Better Plants program US Department of Energy has established Waste Reduction Network where it is offering technical assistance to partners to achieve these ambitious waste reduction goals. Basic requirements of establishing a target include identifying a baseline, quantifying waste performance, and measuring progress over time. One problem faced by industry is the unstandardized metrics to quantify waste performance that may not be well suited to demonstrate progress. In this paper, we research methods traditionally used to measure waste performance and highlight advantages, gaps and limitations of each method. Suitability of the methods applicable to different manufacturing circumstances are also examined. Finally, we present a case study of a large manufacturer that faced inconsistencies in their tracked measurement metric. A solution was proposed to alter the methodology to enable more accurate waste performance tracking against a baseline.

Chaudhari, Subodh↗
DOE OSTI2025

An On-Demand Electric Transit Case Study of New Rochelle, New York

This work explores the extent to which an on-demand mobility service utilizing lightweight electric vehicles (EVs) provides community and sustainability benefits in New Rochelle, New York. Travel and survey data from September 2019 through 2023 are used to describe the system and estimate impacts on travelers. The system was found to be used more by women (nearly 60%) and younger demographics (>65% under the age of 42), with peak use in the middle of the day and a grocery store as a top origin and destination. The service is utilized primarily for short trips (86% under 2 miles), and the small, right-sized EVs have carbon dioxide emissions associated with charging the fleet that are roughly one-quarter of the fleet emissions of conventional hybrid vans and nearly 50 times less than a fleet of diesel buses. Mapping current socio-spatial dynamics of travel demand can inform equity performance, as well as assist future planning and service area development and possible extensions to similar smaller, lower-density environments that are nearby and connected to major metropolitan areas. The findings in this case study suggest on-demand electric transit may be a significant and growing space for advancing clean and highly valued public mobility services. Sustainable public transport interventions that consider right-sized, electric, on-demand vehicles can help achieve improved accessibility and reduce energy use and greenhouse gas emissions. This work was presented at the Transportation Research Board (TRB) 2025 Annual Meeting on January 7, 2025.

ADVANCED PROPULSION SYSTEMS,ENERGY PLANNING, POLIC↗
DOE OSTI2025

Computational Fluid Dynamics Simulations of Glass Vitrification Refractory Coupon Tests

The Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant (WTP) at the Hanford site is nearing the start of the Direct-Feed Low-Activity Waste (DFLAW) operations. DFLAW is destined to convert a pretreated low activity waste portion of the 56 million gallons of tank waste into a stable solid glass. In the subsequent decade completion of the high-level waste (HLW) facility is anticipated. Sustained operational missions of both LAW and HLW melter facilities are expected over multiple decades. In high-temperature glass melters, the refractory lining corrodes over time, which could potentially be an issue for longer term operations, this refractory corrosion is higher at the level of the glass-air interface due to surface tension driven flow. The glass viscosity, melt pool temperature, and glass chemical composition can impact the rate at which the refractory corrodes. This rate is important to quantify for the various waste glasses to be produced at the WTP since the integrity of the refractory should not be a limiting factor affecting the lifetime of the melter. To this end, a series of glasses representative of the first batches of waste glass produced by the WTP will be melted in small-scale crucibles with Monofrax® K-3 coupons inserted. The corrosion of the K-3 will be measured in the melt and at the meltline (or neckline). A model for the corrosion rate will be constructed and implemented into a previously developed framework for a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model of the full-scale WTP. To assist with experimental design and validate the implementation of the model in the full-scale melter, CFD simulations of the small-scale crucible tests were performed. The bubbling that occurs in the small-scale crucible is initially validated here with a model that uses silicone oil at room temperature. The viscosity of the oil ranges from 1 to 100 Pa•s, which corresponds to operating glass pool temperatures near 1150 °C down to idling temperatures near 950 °C. The simulation results show good agreement with the bubble sizes that form during experiments. CFD modeling of the crucible setup was used to determine bubbling characteristics to match the range of near-wall velocities expected in the full-scale WTP. This study presents the initial CFD modeling results, corrosion testing plan, and some preliminary corrosion samples with an outline for the next steps for the development of the corrosion model.

Abboud, Alexander W. [Idaho National Lab]↗
DOE OSTI2025

Summary of Graphite Data Stored within NDMAS

The Graphite Technology Development Project provides data to support the design of graphite core components within specific reactor service conditions of the next generation of high-temperature, gas-cooled nuclear reactors. Physical, mechanical, and thermal properties of nuclear grade graphite were characterized for specimens that were unirradiated, irradiated, and irradiated under various stress conditions. The material properties include diameter, length, mass, density, compressive strength, tensile strength, flexural strength, modulus, resistivity, thermal diffusivity, and thermal expansion coefficient. Baseline graphite specimens are unirradiated from different grades (2114, IG-110, NBG-17, NBG-18, and PCEA) and different types used in different characterization tests (compressive, flexural, tensile, one-inch cylinder, and quarter-inch cylinder). The Advanced Graphite Creep (AGC) irradiation specimens are from a much larger number of grades and cylinder types (creep, piggyback, and pencil). For baseline graphite, characterization data for 7,756 specimens extracted from thirteen graphite billets were captured to the NDMAS database. For AGC experiments, four irradiation campaigns have been completed: AGC-1, AGC-2, AGC-3, and AGC-4. The ongoing HDG-1 (High-Dose Graphite) experiment, which began irradiation with Cycle 168B on August 26, 2020, includes specimens previously irradiated in AGC-2 in addition to the specimens originally destined for AGC-5.. Besides the characterization data, the AGC data includes irradiation monitoring and physics data representing the irradiation conditions of AGC specimens. Currently, all data for AGC-1, AGC-2, and AGC-3 have been captured to the NDMAS database. Only AGC-4 pre-irradiation and irradiation monitoring data have been captured, and HDG-1 pre-irradiation data are in process of being captured for unirradiated specimens. To date, a total of 38,149 material property records have been captured into NDMAS database for baseline and AGC specimens. All characterization data are qualified for use according to their perspective data verification reports. For the AGC irradiation campaigns, a total of 41,502 qualified physics calculation records were added for AGC-1, AGC-2, and AGC-3. Finally, a total of 173,698,505 AGC irradiation monitoring data records (thermocouple temperature, gas flow rate, gas pressure, gas moisture, applied load, and specimen displacement) have been captured to NDMAS; the majority of those records (~94%) are qualified data records.

11 - NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Bayesian Framework for Bioburden Density Estimation in Planetary Protection

To comply with the international planetary protection policy set forth by the Committee on Space Research and NASA Agency level requirements, spacecraft destined to biologically sensitive planetary bodies have to minimize terrestrial biological contamination. Analysis, testing and inspection are the standard forward verification activities that are used to demonstrate compliance with the biological contamination requirements. For testing of spacecraft surface areas, a swab or wipe sample is collected from surfaces prior to last access and subsequently processed in the lab using NASA Approved Planetary Protection Methods for Culture Based Assays. Raw data resulting from this assay is then statistically treated employing a mathematical paradigm stemming from the 1970’s Viking Lander Project to generate the bioburden density and total microbial bioburden present. This standard approach arbitrarily accounts for error and provides an upper conservative bound as it reports the maximum number of spores estimated to be present on flight hardware surfaces. A bioburden density estimate factors in the following variables: the observed bioburden count, representative volume processed, sampling efficiencies. Notably, to account for error in the approach, a 0 observed count is arbitrarily changed to a count of 1 for each hardware grouping. The data generated by spacecraft bioburden verification campaigns in the past have resulted in <80% of wipes and <90% of swabs containing a bioburden count of 0. As such, having a robust and well documented statistical approach for dealing with the probability of low incident rates is necessary to be able to estimate spacecraft bioburden. Being able to statistically describe the bioburden distribution and associated confidence level is a gamechanger for the development of bioburden allocations during mission design and will allow for tighter management of risk throughout spacecraft build. Thus, Empirical Bayes statistical approach was evaluated to estimate the microbial bioburden on spacecraft to mitigate the aforementioned mathematical concerns and provide a probabilistic bioburden distribution of the flight hardware surface. For application of this approach to performing bioburden calculations, a range of non-informative prior assumptions on hardware surfaces are explored for Bayesian analyses while informative priors using posterior distributions from prior assays are utilized for Empirical Bayes analyses. Several non-informative priors are currently under investigation to assess fitness including use of these priors to serve as a foundation to build off of NASA specification values or a basis of risk to account for unknowns during the integration and testing process. Informative priors under consideration are generated using sampled bioburden values from hardware originating within like processing environments (e.g. vendor cleaning process or similar assembly process), temporal spacecraft status events as a prediction for hardware cleanliness of future samples, and heritage system bioburden actuals to predict allocation for subsequent missions. Informative priors and probabilistic bioburden distributions are then validated using data sets from the Mars Exploration Rover, Mars Science Laboratory, and InSight missions. Using Empirical Bayes approach to generate a probabilistic bioburden distribution as demonstrated through mission use cases provides a valid approach for use in the end-to-end requirements verification process.

97 - MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2026

Validating Simulated Models of Energy Consumption by a Battery Electric Motorcoach: A real-world deployment in a harsh climate.

Many efforts have been made to simulate energy consumption of battery electric buses (BEBs) to optimize their deployment into existing fleets. The models produced, however, are rarely validated against real-world consumption data, limiting their generalizability and widespread application to fleets around the US. Furthermore, a major concern specific to BEBs is the effects of harsh climates on their performance. We build upon the state-of-the-art energy consumption modeling techniques developed for BEBs and apply them to a unique geographic context and a unique electrified vehicle. This geography, climate, and vehicle further the existing understanding of the factors affecting medium- and heavy-duty electric vehicles (MHDEVs) by allowing for new relationships to be tested and by assessing the generalizability of known relationships to new contexts. We find that temperature is less predictive of energy consumption for the battery electric motorcoach (BEM) in the case study environment than it is for BEBs in other studies. A mitigating factor that we presume to be working on the relationship between temperature and energy consumption is the fact that the BEM route does not stop between origin and destination to exchange passengers, and in turn, conditioned cabin air. Our model also incorporates wind speed and direction relative to travel, which is a novel contribution of our methodology. Results from our study are helpful for transit service planners, fleet operators, and logistics firms for improving their ability to predict performance of potential deployments of MHDEVs into existing operations.

32 - ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZA↗
DOE OSTI2021

Portable Filtration Skid

To create a portable filtration skid with the capability to process 500 gallons of wastewater with an unknown particle size distribution.

47 OTHER INSTRUMENTATION↗
DOE OSTI2022

2021-2022 Remote Work Study Final Results

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced many organizations—from national laboratories to private companies—to change their workforce model to incorporate remote work. This study and the summarized results sought to understand the experiences of remote workers and the ways that remote work can impact recruitment and retention, employee engagement, and career development. Sandia, like many companies, has committed to establishing a hybrid work model that will persist postpandemic, and more Sandia employees than ever before have initiated remote work agreements. This parallels the nationwide increase in remote employment and motivates this study on remote work as an enduring part of workforce models.

99 GENERAL AND MISCELLANEOUS↗