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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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All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2021

The Evolving Solar Energy Innovation Ecosystem in Puerto Rico

This report presents initial findings from the research project, “Developing socially and economically generative, resilient PV-energy systems for low- and moderate-income communities: Applications for Puerto Rico.” This material is based upon work supported primarily by the US Department of Energy’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy under the Solar Energy Technology Office Fiscal Year 2018 Funding Program award number DE-EE0008570 and in part by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Department of Energy (DOE) under NSF CA No. EEC-1041895. This project is a joint effort of Arizona State University’s Center for Energy and Society; the University of Puerto Rico-Mayaguez’s Center for Hemispheric Cooperation in Research and Education in Engineering and Applied Science, Sustainable Energy Center, and National Institute for Energy and Island Sustainability; and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. The project seeks to understand the place of energy in low-income communities in Puerto Rico, the opportunities for solar energy to provide solutions to the energy challenges facing these communities, and the capacity of the solar energy innovation ecosystem in Puerto Rico to deliver relevant solar solutions for these communities. We define the solar energy innovation ecosystem as the diverse actors and stakeholders whose collective networks and actions—and the flows among them of ideas, knowledge, data, influence, money, and equipment, as well as the rules that govern those flows—are essential to the success of renewable energy markets and projects. This report presents results from the first year of the project’s research, which has concentrated on several key goals: (1) characterizing the trajectory of solar energy development in Puerto Rico in the three years since Hurricane María; (2) mapping and characterizing the current solar energy innovation ecosystem in Puerto Rico, including the technical potential for solar energy in Puerto Rico, and the business and policy landscape shaping solar developments; and (3) beginning to characterize the broad landscape of community energy initiatives underway in Puerto Rico. To pursue these goals, we engaged in a systematic review of solar energy developments in Puerto Rico and conducted interviews with over 100 members of the solar energy innovation, including policy, business, finance, research, and civil society leaders, as well as solar users. Solar technical potential data for Puerto Rico was developed by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) and is publicly available at: https://data.nrel.gov/submissions/144. The documentation for the NREL dataset is included as Appendix A.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗
DOE OSTI2024

Case Studies in Leveraging Performance Contracts for Resilience Projects

The resilience of federal facilities has become increasingly important among lawmakers, agency leadership, and the American public as high impact natural hazards occur more frequently over time. Resilience is broadly defined as the ability of a federal facility to withstand, respond to, and recover rapidly from disruptions to maintain critical functions. The Department of Energy (DOE) Federal Energy Management Program (FEMP) was codified to facilitate the strengthening of federal energy and water efficiency and resilience. Performance contracting is one of the mechanisms through which federal agencies can finance projects at their facilities, but resilience improvement measures do not always result in utility cost savings, which are the primary driver behind performance contracts. This report provides example cases where performance contracts, specifically energy savings performance contracts (ESPC) or utility energy service contracts (UESCs), were used to implement a resilience measure at a federal facility.

99 GENERAL AND MISCELLANEOUS↗
DOE OSTI2023

Rapid CFD Using Machine Learning Algorithms (CRADA Final Report)

This is a collaborative effort between Lawrence Livermore National Security, LLC as manager and operator of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (“LLNL”) and Guardian Glass, LLC ("Guardian Glass") to develop a fast-running emulator of the reactive Computational Fluid Dynamics (“CFD”) simulations needed to understand the complex reactions and flows in the glass melting, fining, and forming subprocesses. This CRADA project is sponsored under the High-Performance Computing for Manufacturing (“HPC4Mfg”) Program of the Department of Energy’s Advanced Manufacturing Office (“AMO”) within the Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (“EERE”) Office.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
NASA NTRS1978

Propulsion

NASA aims at developing propulsion technology to reduce the fuel consumption of present engines by 5%, that of new engines of the late 1980s by at least 12%, and that of an advanced early 1990s turboprop by an additional 15%. This paper reviews three separate NASA programs which take up these aims. They are, respectively, Engine Component Improvement, Energy Efficient Engine, and Advanced Turboprops.

Nored, D. L.↗
NASA NTRS1984

The future of crystalline silicon technology in the US Department of Energy program

Two basic findings were presented in the outlined report. The first is that silicon has a very high potential efficiency, demonstrated improvement in reliability and a significant potential for cost reductions. The second is that the photovoltaic technology development process is highly uncertain, but crystalline silicon technology has a substantial knowledge base to draw from, improving its chances of success. Several issues to be addressed are outlined.

Scolaro, A. F.↗
NASA NTRS2001

Overview of NASA Studies on High-Temperature Ceramic Fibers

NASA, DOD (Department of Defense), and DOE (Department of Energy) are currently looking to the NASA UEET (Ultra-Efficient Engine Technology) Program to develop ceramic matrix composites (CMC) for hot-section components in advanced power and propulsion systems. Success will greatly depend on developing ceramic fibers with a variety of key thermostructural properties, in particular, high as-produced tensile strength and retention of a large fraction of this strength for long times under the anticipated CMC service conditions. Current UEET approaches center on selecting the optimum fiber type from commercially available fibers since the costs for development of advanced fibers are high and the markets for high-temperature CMC have yet to be established.

DiCarlo, James A.↗
NASA NTRS2012

Performance Assessment of Baseline Cells for the High Efficiency Space Power Systems Project

The Enabling Technology Development and Demonstration (ETDD) Program High Efficiency Space Power Systems (HESPS) Project, formerly the Exploration Technology Development Program (ETDP) Energy Storage Project is tasked with developing advanced lithium-ion cells for future NASA Exploration missions. Under this project, components under development via various in-house and contracted efforts are delivered to Saft America for scale-up and integration into cells. Progress toward meeting project goals will be measured by comparing the performance to these cells with cells of a similar format with Saft s state-of-the-art aerospace chemistry. This report discusses the results of testing performed on the first set of baseline cells delivered by Saft to the NASA Glenn Research Center. This build is a cylindrical "DD" geometry with a 10 Ah nameplate capacity. Testing is being performed to establish baseline cell performance at conditions relevant to ETDD HESPS Battery Key Performance Parameter (KPP) goals including various temperatures, rates, and cycle life conditions. Data obtained from these cells will serve as a performance baseline for future cell builds containing optimized ETDD HESPSdeveloped materials. A test plan for these cells was developed to measure cell performance against the high energy cell KPP goals. The goal for cell-level specific energy of the high energy technology is 180 Wh/kg at a C/10 discharge rate and 0 C. The cells should operate for at least 2000 cycles at 100 percent DOD with 80 percent capacity retention. Baseline DD cells delivered 152 Wh/kg at 20 C. This number decreased to 143.9 Wh/kg with a 0 C discharge. This report provides performance data and summarizes results of the testing performed on the DD cells.

Schneidegger, Brianne T.↗
DOE OSTI2020

Energy Snapshot - Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands

This profile provides a snapshot of the energy landscape of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI), a commonwealth in political union with the United States that is located in the northern Pacific Ocean. CNMI's electricity rates for residential customers range from $0.21 to $0.35 U.S. dollars (USD) per kilowatt-hour (kWh), above the average U.S. residential rate of $0.13 USD/kWh.

44 EE - Strategic Programs, Energy Transition Init↗
DOE OSTI2022

End-Use Load Profiles for the U.S. Building Stock: Technical Advisory Group Meeting #11

A technical advisory group guided the End-Use Load Profiles dataset development to ensure that the direction and outcomes of the work were aligned with market needs. The technical advisory group included roughly 100 representatives from organizations that were likely to use the resulting load profiles in their work, including utility companies, utility program implementers, grid operators, consultancies, research centers, state regulatory agencies, and regional energy efficiency organizations. This is the presentation from TAG Meeting #11.

buildings↗
DOE OSTI2024

Gains in operational flexibility, safety margins, and cost efficiencies via integrated Plant Reload Optimization platform

The U.S. Department of Energy Light Water Reactor Sustainability Program Risk-Informed Systems Analysis Pathway Plant Reload Optimization Project aims to develop an integrated, comprehensive framework offering an all-in-one solution for reload evaluations with a special focus on optimizing core design. Optimizing the fuel loading pattern is one of the most important considerations in reducing the amount of new fuel used in the core. Due to thousands of possible core configuration options, finding optimal solutions is an unachievable task for a human. The Plant ReLoad Optimization platform, which supports artificial-intelligence-based reactor core designing, is now fully capable of handling realistic problems. The Plant ReLoad Optimization platform development project aims to build a reactor core design tool that includes reactor safety and fuel performance analyses and uses artificial intelligence to support the optimization of core design solutions. The NSGA-II (Non-dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm II) optimizer was developed and tested within RAVEN (Risk Analysis and Virtual ENvironment) to handle many constraints by using an augmented objectives methodology. The demonstration was performed with constrained multiobjective optimization of a 17 × 17 pressurized-water reactor core loading patterns to minimize fuel cost and maximize fuel cycle length.

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS↗
DOE OSTI2019

Certification and Rating of Attachments for Fenestration Technologies

In the U.S., windows still represent a significant energy savings opportunity in residential and commercial buildings, and for decades the United States Department of Energy (DOE) has funded fenestration software tools, analysis, studies, and the National Fenestration Rating Council (NFRC). Despite significant developments in window technology and recognition of efficient products, studies conducted by the U.S. Energy Information Administration and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) found that approximately 64% of U.S. homes currently have inefficient windows. Window attachments (interior and exterior blinds, shades, storm windows, awnings, shutters, etc.) can offer a more cost-effective option to improve the energy performance of residential and commercial windows. In previous years, the window attachment industry attempted to work with the NFRC to generate a window attachment rating program, but was unable to access funding or technical resources necessary to address window attachments, which added many levels of complexity on top of NFRC’s scope of windows and glazing. Starting in 2014, the DOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) funded the Window Coverings Manufacturing Association (WCMA) to develop the Attachments Energy Rating Council (AERC) along with policies and procedures to deliver an unbiased, credible, comparable, relevant, and cost-effective window attachment energy rating program for the residential and commercial sectors over a four-year period. This project was created because there were no consistent and credible performance rating mechanisms for assessing the energy performance of window attachments. Without a standardized approach, consumers found it difficult to make informed and comparative decisions about the energy performance of window attachments, and utilities faced challenges offering incentives for energy-efficient attachments. The goal of this project was two-fold: to develop procedures to rate and certify the energy performance of window attachments and to create an educational, consumer-facing Certified Products Website (CPW) to help consumers and other stakeholders make more informed window attachments purchasing decisions.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
DOE OSTI2025

Residential Building Stock Characterization in Palm Beach County, Florida

This building stock characterizations is intended to help Palm Beach County (PBC) Office of Resilience (OOR) and municipalities composing the Municipal Resilience Partnership prioritize building energy efficiency investments to reduce energy costs and increase resilience for the county's most vulnerable residents. The analysis utilizes NREL’s ResStock model to characterize PBC’s residential building stock, including building type, renter/owner status, size (square footage), age of buildings (vintage), HVAC system types, and, for multi-family buildings, number of units. Building energy efficiency, weatherization, and electrification upgrade packages were assessed for approximate cost, customer bill-savings, and emissions reductions potential and findings will help guide OOR financial assistance program design.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
DOE OSTI2023

Performance Characterization and Energy Savings Assessment of a Radial Flux Surface Permanent Magnet Motor Technology

This project is part of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory's (NREL's) "Commercialization Assistance Program" to provide technical expertise to help emerging companies overcome technical barriers to commercialization. In this study, NREL has evaluated the efficiency and energy saving potential of a novel motor technology designed by ZEUS Motor Inc. located in Wheat Ridge, Colorado. The motor expands on permanent magnet AC motor (PMAC) design to create a new "radial flux, surface PMAC", or RF-sPMAC motor that is expected to outperform other novel motor technologies on the market. Here, the motor showed considerable energy benefits over typical induction motors. The motor benefits from a tightly-packed magnetic steel and copper stator that allows the motor size to be reduced to a thin disc with an internal cavity 1/30th the size of a traditional induction motor. The housing is also aluminum which is magnetically benign. This eliminates the need for external cooling (up to 25 HP), in addition to reducing power consumption.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
NASA NTRS1977

Status of the DOE /STOR/-sponsored national program on hydrogen production from water via thermochemical cycles

A pure thermochemical cycle is a system of linked regenerative chemical reactions which accepts only water and heat and produces hydrogen. Thermochemical cycles are potentially a more efficient and cheaper means of producing hydrogen from water than is the generation of electricity followed by electrolysis. The Energy Storage Systems Division of the Department of Energy is currently funding a national program on thermochemical hydrogen production. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is responsible for the technical management of this program. The goal is to develop a cycle which can potentially operate with an efficiency greater than 40% using a heat source providing a maximum available temperature of 1150 K. A closed bench-scale demonstration of such a cycle would follow. This cycle would be labeled a 'reference cycle' and would serve as a baseline against which future cycles would be compared.

Baker, C. E.↗
DOE OSTI2023

Advancing Energy Efficiency Through Workforce Training

This Final Technical Report summarizes the work done on to develop and implement the Energy Basics Training Tool with industry partners and the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. This project leveraged existing infrastructure and content developed by DOE in the Building America Solution Center (BASC) and Building Science Education Solution Center (BSESC) to design model content sets for use in entry-level construction programs at the high school certificate, boot camp, and other entry level training programs.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
NASA NTRS1984

The U.S. and Japanese amorphous silicon technology programs A comparison

The U.S. Department of Energy/Solar Energy Research Institute Amorphous Silicon (a-Si) Solar Cell Program performs R&D on thin-film hydrogenated amorphous silicon for eventual development of stable amorphous silicon cells with 12 percent efficiency by 1988. The Amorphous Silicon Solar Cell Program in Japan is sponsored by the Sunshine Project to develop an alternate energy technology. While the objectives of both programs are to eventually develop a-Si photovoltaic modules and arrays that would produce electricity to compete with utility electricity cost, the U.S. program approach is research oriented and the Japanese is development oriented.

Shimada, K.↗
DOE OSTI2021

Efficient Automated Driving Strategies Leveraging Anticipation and Optimal Control

Automated vehicles and advanced driver assistance systems bring computation, sensing, and communication technologies that exceed human abilities in some ways. For example, automated vehicles may sense a panorama all at once, do not suffer from human impairments and distractions, and could wirelessly communicate precise data with neighboring vehicles. Prototype and commercial deployments have demonstrated the capability to relieve human operators of some driving tasks up to and including fully autonomous taxi rides in some areas. The ultimate impact of this technology’s large-scale market penetration on energy efficiency remains unclear, with potential negative factors like road use by empty vehicles competing with positive ones like automatic eco-driving. Fundamentally enabled by historic and look-ahead data, this dissertation addresses the use of automated driving and driver assistance to optimize vehicle motion for energy efficiency. Facets of this problem include car following, co-optimized acceleration and lane change planning, and collaborative multi-agent guidance. Optimal control, especially model predictive control, is used extensively to improve energy efficiency while maintaining safe and timely driving via constraints. Techniques including chance constraints and mixed integer programming help overcome uncertainty and non-convexity challenges. Extensions of these techniques to tractor trailers on sloping roads are provided by making use of linear parameter-varying models. To approach the wheel-input energy eco-driving problem over generally shaped sloping roads with the computational potential for closed-loop implementation, a linear programming formulation is constructed. Distributed and collaborative techniques that enable connected and automated vehicles to accommodate their neighbors in traffic are also explored and compared to centralized control. Using simulations and vehicle-in-the-loop car following experiments, the proposed algorithms are benchmarked against others that do not make use of look-ahead information.

Dollar, Robert Austin↗