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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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64 records · Page 4
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2025

Remote Sensing Approach for Monitoring Tree Health Adjacent to Transmission Corridors

This study presents an initial proof-of-concept for a satellite-based remote sensing approach to identify and monitor potential areas of poor tree health across the entire BPA service territory on an annual basis. We tested three variants of “delta peak NDVI” ( ΔPN ) change detection metrics that express interannual variation in primary productivity relative to a baseline by comparing ΔPN values for known insect/disease disturbances and nearby reference locations. All three metrics showed promise for detecting poor tree health in the year during disturbance, but the metric based on the difference from the long-term (2016-2024) median ( Δ Med PN ) was preferred due to its responsiveness to change in the years during and after disturbance, resilience to interannual variation, and ease of interpretation as being above or below normal. Comparison of Δ Med PN grouped by relative severity of disturbance indicated it was not sensitive enough to detect “low” severity disturbances, as mapped by USGS’s LANDFIRE program, but could distinguish “moderate” and “high” severity disturbances from reference locations. These findings informed selection of a threshold for Δ Med PN , which was combined with areas exhibiting negative NDVI to map potential areas of concern. Visual inspection of before/after high-resolution imagery and NDVI time series showed that many areas of concern aligned with visible signs of defoliation and die-off as well as other types of disturbance (e.g., landslides, logging, road grading, flooding). Some areas of concern are thought to be false detections caused by persistent shadow, and some could not be explained with visual inspection due to spatiotemporal limitations of before/after imagery. In summary, our approach shows promise for large-scale monitoring of tree health adjacent to BPA transmission lines, but additional work is recommended to improve model sophistication and remove noise.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗
DOE OSTI2025

CLEAP Project: OR-SAGE Analysis for MT, UT, and CO States

The OR-SAGE tool is designed to use industry-accepted practices in screening sites and then employ the proper array of data sources through the considerable computational capabilities of GIS technology available at ORNL. The tool was developed to screen the potential for NPP siting on a national and regional basis. However, because of the tool granularity, it is often focused specifically on the immediate area around user sites of interest. If data center siting parameters can be added to OR-SAGE, the ability to evaluate data center siting on a localized scale will be beneficial.1 More than 60 data sets have been collected and processed by ORNL to develop exclusionary, avoidance, and suitability criteria for screening sites for a variety of power generation types, including nuclear power plants. Available site evaluation parameters include population density, slope, seismic activity, proximity to cooling-water sources, proximity to hazard facilities, avoidance of protected lands and floodplains, susceptibility to landslide hazards, and many others. All siting parameters should be considered as flags to inform siting decisions and should not be used to rule in or rule out any NPP site. Once data center siting parameters are identified, appropriate data sets will be collected and processed. The OR-SAGE process is very versatile. Essentially, OR-SAGE is a visual, relational database. The database partitions the contiguous United States, a total of 720 million hectares (~1.8 billion acres), into 100-m by 100-m (1 hectare or ~2.5 acre) cells. The database is tracking just under 700 million individual land cells. Successive suitability criterion is applied to each cell in the database. User-specified thresholds can be applied to each siting parameter data layer. In this manner, a variety of scenarios can be quickly and thoroughly evaluated. Data can be added and/or revised within OR-SAGE to address user interests. Siting security assessment capability is currently being added to OR-SAGE. Security is expected to be of concern at data centers whether it is collocated with a nuclear power generating technology or not. If data center is collocated with a nuclear power generating source, the security threat attractiveness level of both will likely increase. It will be of additional benefit if a potential data center site is also assessed for security vulnerability.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2026

Leveraging ARM Data to Improve Models for Predictive Understanding of Energy and Security Challenges

Extreme weather and natural hazards can disrupt the energy sector, affecting demand, generation, transmission, distribution, consumption and operational planning at regional and national scales. These disruptions stem from a broad range of atmospheric phenomena, including winter storms, freezing rain, wet snow loading, severe convection, flooding and landslides, wildfires, prolonged heat, and drought. Many of these same phenomena can also affect national security through impacts to transportation and infrastructure. To support the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) focus on energy resilience and national security, the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) User Facility is uniquely positioned to contribute measurement data, analyses, and modeling frameworks that can significantly improve predictive understanding of these hazards to mitigate their effects. To explore this opportunity, ARM convened a two-part virtual workshop in November 2025. The workshop engaged interdisciplinary experts in atmospheric science, energy systems, modeling, and operations. The goal of the meeting was to engage with these interdisciplinary experts to address three questions: • What are examples of atmospheric processes that represent significant risks to energy security or national security and where are those risks greatest? • What measurements or measurement strategies would improve ARM’s capacity to address these issues? • How can ARM and users of the ARM facility better work with the Energy Exascale Earth System Model (E3SM) and multi-sector modeling communities to apply ARM data to improving E3SM simulations of these phenomena? Participants were asked to submit white papers ahead of the meeting to initiate thinking on these themes and to help organize discussions. Workshop sessions were then organized around themes identified in the white papers. First from the white papers and then through subsequent discussions, workshop participants identified many examples that address the three questions listed above. Participants called out energy system vulnerabilities to weather phenomena such as the impact of freezing rain, strong winds, and excessive heat on power grids. They also noted the effects that weather phenomena could have on energy demand or supply (e.g., through effects of extreme temperatures). They called out security vulnerabilities such as impacts to crops from aerosol-borne pathogens and risks to industry due to melting permafrost in the Arctic. In all, over a dozen meteorological phenomena were linked to energy or security vulnerabilities. For many of the identified phenomena, participants pointed out where ARM was well poised to address issues (e.g., through measurements of cloud microphysics to inform studies of freezing rain) but also noted needs for additional measurements or modified measurement strategies. For example, adaptive scanning of severe weather would be valuable for probing winter storms or severe convection. Participants pointed out the value in integrating external observations with ARM measurements and with applying artificial intelligence (AI) to ARM observation analysis and they advocated for using model simulations to help optimize measurement strategies through Observing System Simulation Experiments (OSSEs). It was clear from the workshop that there are many ways that ARM observations can be used to mitigate energy and security concerns, but meeting participants were also asked to identify what they considered to be the greatest opportunities by ranking issues pertaining to the three workshop questions. This was accomplished through a survey administered to participants between the two virtual sessions. The highest-priority phenomena identified were winter storms, severe convection, and arctic processes. Discussion in the second session, therefore, focused primarily on these three areas, which were most fully developed in exploring ARM opportunities. Nevertheless, it was also clear that ARM has opportunities to contribute to all the identified topics. This report describes the workshop, including input from discussion and white papers (Sections 2 and 3) and a list of priority recommendations (section 4). Many other ideas for ARM contributions are discussed in individual white papers (Appendix D).

29 ENERGY PLANNING, POLICY, AND ECONOMY↗
DOE OSTI2021

Fracture Network Localization Preceding Catastrophic Failure in Triaxial Compression Experiments on Rocks

We quantify the spatial distribution of fracture networks throughout six in situ X-ray tomography triaxial compression experiments on crystalline rocks at confining stresses of 5–35 MPa in order to quantify how fracture development controls the final macroscopic failure of the rock, a process analogous to those that control geohazards such as earthquakes and landslides. Tracking the proportion of the cumulative volume of fractures with volumes >90th percentile to the total fracture volume, ∑ v 90 / v t o t indicates that the fracture networks tend to increase in localization toward these largest fractures for up to 80% of the applied differential stress. The evolution of this metric also matches the evolution of the Gini coefficient, which measures the deviation of a population from uniformity. These results are consistent with observations of localizing low magnitude seismicity before large earthquakes in southern California. In both this analysis and the present work, phases of delocalization interrupt the general increase in localization preceding catastrophic failure, indicating that delocalization does not necessarily indicate a reduction of seismic hazard. However, the proportion of the maximum fracture volume to the total fracture volume does not increase monotonically. Experiments with higher confining stress tend to experience greater localization. To further quantify localization, we compare the geometry of the largest fractures, with volumes >90th percentile, to the best fit plane through these fractures immediately preceding failure. The r 2 scores and the mean distance of the fractures to the plane indicate greater localization in monzonite than in granite. The smaller mean mineral diameter and lower confining stress in the granite experiments may contribute to this result. Tracking these various metrics of localization reveals a close association between macroscopic yielding and the acceleration of fracture network localization. Near yielding, ∑ v 90 / v t o t and the Gini coefficient increase while the mean distance to the final failure plane decreases. Macroscopic yielding thus occurs when the rate of fracture network localization increases.

58 GEOSCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2022

Life Expectancy of Evaporating Capillary Bridges Predicted by Tertiary Creep Modeling

The evaporation of capillary bridges is experimentally investigated at the microscale through a three-grain capillary cluster. This setting provides the minimum viable description of Haines jumps during evaporation, that is, capillary instabilities stemming from air entry into a saturated granular material. The displacement profile of a meniscus is obtained via digital image correlation for different grain materials, geometries, and separations. While it is well known that Haines jumps are triggered at the pore throat, we find that these instabilities are of three types depending on the separation. We also provide a temporal characterization of Haines jumps; we find that they are accurately described, as tertiary creep instabilities, by Voight’s relation, similarly to landslides and volcanic eruptions. This finding extends the description of capillary instabilities beyond their onset predicted by Laplace equilibrium. Our contribution also paves the way for a microscopically-informed description of desiccation cracks, of which Haines jumps are the precursors.

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS↗
DOE OSTI2021

A New Method for High Resolution Surface Change Detection: Data Collection and Validation of Measurements from UAS at the Nevada National Security Site, Nevada, USA

The use of uncrewed aerial systems (UAS) increases the opportunities for detecting surface changes in remote areas and in challenging terrain. Detecting surface topographic changes offers an important constraint for understanding earthquake damage, groundwater depletion, effects of mining, and other events. For these purposes, changes on the order of 5–10 cm are readily detected, but sometimes it is necessary to detect smaller changes. An example is the surface changes that result from underground explosions, which can be as small as 3 cm. Previous studies that described change detection methodologies were generally not aimed at detecting sub-5-cm changes. Additionally, studies focused on high-fidelity accuracy were either computationally modeled or did not fully provide the necessary examples to highlight the usability of these workflows. Detecting changes at this threshold may be critical in certain applications, such as global security research and monitoring for high-consequence natural hazards, including landslides. Here we provide a detailed description of the methodology we used to detect 2–3 cm changes in an important applied research setting—surface changes related to underground explosions. This methodology improves the accuracy of change detection data collection and analysis through the optimization of pre-field planning, surveying, flight operations, and post-processing the collected data, all of which are critical to obtaining the highest output data resolution possible. We applied this methodology to a field study location, collecting 1.4 Tb of images over the course of 30 flights, and location data for 239 ground control points (GCPs). We independently verified changes with orthoimagery, and found that structure-from-motion, software-reported root mean square errors (RMSEs) for both control and check points underestimated the actual error. We found that 3 cm changes are detectable with this methodology, thereby improving our knowledge of a rock’s response to underground explosions.

47 OTHER INSTRUMENTATION↗
DOE OSTI2022

Farmers’ Perception of Climate Change and Its Impacts on Agriculture

Climate change and climate variability drive rapid glacier melt and snowpack loss, extreme precipitation and temperature events, and alteration of water availability in the Himalayas. There is increasing observational evidence of climate change impacts on water resource availability and agricultural productivity in the central Himalayan region. Here, we assess the farmers’ perception of climate change and its impacts on agriculture in western Nepal. We interviewed 554 households and conducted eight focus group discussions to collect farmers’ perceptions of temperature and rainfall characteristics, water availability, onset and duration of different seasons, and the impacts of such changes on their lives and livelihoods. Our results indicate that the farmers’ perceptions of rising annual and summer temperatures are consistent with observations. Perception, however, contradicts observed trends in winter temperature, as well as annual, monsoon, and winter precipitation. In addition, farmers are increasingly facing incidences of extreme events, including rainfall, floods, landslides, and droughts. These hazards often impact agricultural production, reducing household income and exacerbating the economic impacts on subsistence farmers. Integrated assessment of farmers’ perceptions and hydrometeorological observations is crucial to improving climate change impact assessment and informing the design of mitigation and adaptation strategies.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2023

Observations of extreme wave runup events on the US Pacific Northwest coast

Extreme, tsunami-like wave runup events in the absence of earthquakes or landslides have been attributed to trapped waves over shallow bathymetry, long waves created by atmospheric disturbances, and long waves generated by abrupt breaking. These runup events are associated with inland excursions of hundreds of meters and periods of minutes. While the theory of radiation stress implies that nearshore energy transfer from the carrier waves to the infragravity waves can also lead to very large runup, there have not been observations of runup events induced by this process with magnitudes and periods comparable to the other three mechanisms. This work presents observations of several runup events in the US Pacific Northwest that are comparable to extreme runup events related to the other three mechanisms. It also discusses possible generation mechanisms and shows that energy transfer from carrier waves to bound infragravity waves is a plausible generation mechanism. In addition, a method to predict and forecast extreme runup events with similar characteristics is presented.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2025

A rheological model for loose sands with insights from DEM

A rheological model for loose granular media is developed to capture both solid-like and fluid-like responses during shearing. The proposed model is built by following the mathematical structure of an extended Kelvin–Voigt model, where an elastic spring and plastic slider act in parallel to a viscous damper. This arrangement requires the partition of the total stress into rate-independent and rate-dependent stress components. To model the solid-like behavior, a simple frictional plasticity model is adopted without modifications, thus contributing to the rate-independent stress. Instead, the fluid-like or rate-dependent stress is further decomposed into deviatoric and volumetric parts, by proposing a new formulation based on a combination of the μ(I) relation, originally developed under pressure-controlled shear, with a pressure-shear rate relation derived under volume-controlled shear. The proposed formulation allows the model to capture both the increase in the friction coefficient and the enhanced dilation at high shear rates. High-fidelity simulation data, obtained from discrete element method and multiscale modelling, are used to evaluate the performance of the proposed constitutive model. The model provides accurate results under both drained and undrained simple shear paths across a wide range of shear rates. Furthermore, it successfully reproduces at much lower computational cost the flowslide mobility computed through multiscale simulations, which is primarily regulated by the shear rate dependence of the material properties during the dynamic runout stage.

Elasticity↗