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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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67 records · Page 4

The use of LANDSAT-1 imagery for water quality studies in southern Scandinavia

The possibilities of using LANDSAT-1 images for environmental studies, with special references to water quality studies, were investigated by selecting test areas in southern Scandinavia. The MSS images of different bands are compared under the magnification of an Interpretoscope and densitometric analyses are performed in a Schnell-photometer. The possibility of tracing pollution plumes is studied in the Oresund outside Copenhagen. The effect of different sewers and the circulation of the polluted water is analyzed in various situations. The variation in reflectivity of a great number of lakes in South and Middle Sweden is studied by means of densitometric analyses and significant regional differences are found. The correlation with in situ measurements of water quality (turbidity and secchi disc transparency) of the sampled lakes (made by the National Swedish Environment Protection Board) is fairly good.

Hellden, U.↗

Airport Financing and User Charge Systems in the USA

This paper examines the financing of U.S. public airports in a turbulent era of change, and projects toward the future. It begins by briefly outlining historical patterns that have changed the industry, and airport facilities in particular. It then develops basic principles of public finance as applied to public infrastructure, followed by the applicable principles of management. Following that, the current airport financing system is analyzed and contrasted with a socially optimal financing system. A concluding section suggests policy reforms and their likely benefits. The principles of finance and management discussed here are elementary. However, their implications are radical for U.S. airport policy. There is a great deal of room to improve the allocation of aviation infrastructure resources. The application of these basic principles makes it evident that in many cases, current practice is wasteful, environmentally unsound, overly costly, and inequitable. Future investments in public aviation capital will continue to be wasteful until more efficient pricing systems are instituted. Thus, problem in the U.S. is not one of insufficient investment in airport infrastructure, but investment in the wrong types of infrastructure. In the U.S., the vast majority of publically-owned airports are owned by local governments. Thus, while the federal government bad a great deal of influence in financing airports, ultimately these are local decisions. The same is true with many other public infrastructure issues. Katz and Herman (1997) report that in 1995, U.S. net public capital stock equaled almost $4.6 trillion, 72% of which ($3.9 trillion) was owned by state and local governments, most of it in buildings, highways, Streets, sewer systems, and water supply facilities. Thus, public infrastructure finance is fundamentally a local government issue, with implications for federal and state governments in the design of their aid programs.

Bartle, John R.↗

Land Use Planning

Computer technology, aerial photography and space imagery are being combined in a NASA community services program designed to help solve land use and natural resource planning problems. As urban areas grow, so grows the need for comprehensive, up-to-date information on which to base intelligent decisions regarding land use. State and local planners need information such as the nature of urban change, where the changes are occurring, how they affect public safety, transportation, the economy, tax assessment, sewer systems, water quality, flood hazard, noise impact and a great variety of other considerations. Most importantly they need continually updated maps. Preparing timely maps, gathering the essential data and maintaining it in orderly fashion are becoming matters of increasing difficulty. The NASA project, which has nationwide potential for improving efficiency in the planning process, is a pilot program focused on Tacoma, Washington and surrounding Pierce County. Its key element, developed by Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), is a computerized Land Use Management Information System (LUMIS).

Source record↗

Assessing Environmental and Socioeconomic Factors of Urban Flood Vulnerability in Kansas City, Kansas

Pluvial flooding, over-saturated ground, and drainage systems disproportionately impact historically marginalized urban neighborhoods during extreme rainfall events. These communities are impacted by physical and socioeconomic factors that make them vulnerable to flooding events, such as high concentrations of impervious landcover, high precipitation rates, and a combined sewer system framework. Despite known vulnerability to environmental hazards, understanding potential pluvial street-level flooding events are largely unknown. Using the open-source National Capital Project’s Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Tradeoffs (InVEST) Urban Flood Risk Mitigation model, NASA DEVELOP examined neighborhood scale runoff retention and potential economic damages for risk mapping throughout Kansas City, Kansas. The generated outputs aid in identifying vulnerable neighborhoods susceptible to flooding and in need of future intervention. Previous studies have applied this model framework to understand urban flood vulnerability regarding ecosystem services, urban planning, and flood mitigation strategies. We utilized the InVEST outputs to develop indices pertaining to environmental justice factors of race, socioeconomic status, social vulnerability, and health. The findings indicate that historically redlined neighborhoods in Kansas City, Kansas face disproportional impacts from flood events and are subject to greater environmental stressors. This research provides an approach to utilizing an open-source flood vulnerability model to empower neighborhood-scale environmental justice analysis, enhancing the local communities' understanding of present-day impacts of historical environmental injustices.

Hadwynne Gross↗

Hawaiʻi Urban Development: Mapping Urban Infrastructure and Linkages to Wastewater Impacts across Hawaiʻi

Coastal ecosystems and human health across the Hawaiʻian islands are under threat from cesspools and other unpermitted wastewater infrastructure. Cesspools, or home sewage systems that hold wastewater effluent in porous concrete containers underground, discharge raw, untreated sewage directly into waterways. In fact, it is estimated that approximately 88,000 cesspools release 55 million gallons of raw sewage into Hawaiʻi’s waterways each day. Our partners, The Nature Conservancy, Hawaiʻi Regional Office (TNC) and University of Hawaiʻi, Mānoa (UHM), are heavily involved with the implementation and impact of Act 125, which was passed in 2017 by Hawaiʻi State Legislature to help combat these effects. This requires the conversion of cesspools to be upgraded and either converted to approved onsite disposal systems or connected to a sewer system so that the wastewater may be treated and to avoid leaching into the groundwater. Thus, identifying and locating cesspool and other unpermitted wastewater infrastructure is key to state and partner goals. Utilizing NASA Earth observations including Landsat 7 Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (ETM+), Landsat 8 Operational Land Imager (OLI), and Landsat 9 OLI-2 imagery, as well as pre-classified Sentinel-2 Multispectral Instrument (MSI) imagery in Esri’s Living Atlas, our team showcased the various perspectives that wastewater pollution research can use to assist in identifying and tracking urban development and concrete condition. This process was demonstrated by utilizing supervised object-based classification models, calculating various urban indices, and finding building size estimates to calculate effluent levels. Additionally, providing our partners with a GIS Methodology that can be built on to reach their future needs.

urban classification↗

Implementing Mixed Reality Tools to Support Mission Delivery at Hanford - 20520

Mission Support Alliance's (MSA) Public Works and Information Systems organizations have been working with Microsoft Corporation to develop and implement mixed reality operational solutions using their HoloLens technology. This collaborative effort is intended to drive innovative solutions and significantly improve MSA's efficiency in performing work at the Hanford Site. HoloLens, a mixed reality tool, is a commercial off-the-shelf technology that combines a head-mounted viewing screen with applications to help people and organizations learn, communicate, and collaborate more effectively through the use of mixed reality. https://microsoft.com/en-us/hololens MSA's initial pilot successfully demonstrated its ability to use mixed reality utilizing HoloLens' advanced features in a variety of ways, illustrating the potential efficiency gains previously stated as goals of this pilot. These achievements include the development of proprietary technology that allows synchronization between a HoloLens device and a mobile device or alternate global positioning system (GPS) device. This synchronization enables the HoloLens device to access real time GPS location data anywhere on the Hanford Site. This real time location data, combined with MSA's improved Hanford Geographical Information System (GIS) data, enables the mixed reality pilot application to identify underground utility systems as well as related utility attributes. This ability will aid utility workers in several areas, including excavation activities, the placement of large cranes, identifying interactions and conflicts with future underground utility placements and, eventually, recognizing and de-conflicting tank waste transfer system valve alignments. The HoloLens mixed reality application is also able to provide full or small scale holographic images of a facility's digital twin. This feature will allow MSA's Water and Sewer Utilities team to train and validate procedures associated with the new water treatment facility virtually, before it is constructed. This reduces the amount of time it takes to complete the training and procedure validation, and accelerates the overall construction schedule. (authors)

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE W↗

Infrastructure and DFLAW Support at Hanford - 20443

Manhattan Project era infrastructure systems are degrading at an accelerated pace across the Department of Energy's (DOE) Environmental Management complex. Revitalizing, rejuvenating and right-sizing these systems to ensure reliability for ongoing cleanup missions is a major focus at the 580-square- mile Hanford Site in southeast Washington State. The push to complete construction, commissioning, startup, and operation of facilities and systems in the Direct-Feed Low-Activity Waste (DFLAW) program at Hanford by 2023 requires considerable coordination among site contractors and a significant investment in infrastructure. The passage of time also poses a challenge. It has been about 75 years since facilities were first operated at the site, and approximately 40 years of plutonium production created a legacy of unidentified active and abandoned underground obstacles and waste sites that must be avoided when building and upgrading the infrastructure. Converting infrastructure systems originally built to support plutonium production from the 1940's to the 1980's and upgrading those systems to optimize technology is an ever-changing balance of funding profiles, available resources and execution strategies. The DOE Richland Operations Office (RL) has long recognized the need for increased investment in Hanford Site infrastructure to support the future processing of approximately 56 million gallons of waste currently stored in large underground tanks. When DFLAW is fully operational, safe and reliable infrastructure systems will be needed to ensure continuity of operations around the clock, 365 days a year. These include roadways, water, power, sewer, information technology systems and facilities. To ensure the readiness of Hanford's infrastructure to support treating tank waste in the next three years, 15 projects were identified with a combined value of $133.8 million. Through calendar year 2019, 7 infrastructure projects have been substantially completed and the remaining 8 projects, with a remaining value of $103.8 million, are scheduled to be completed by December 2023. RL and its site services/infrastructure contractor, Mission Support Alliance (MSA), regularly evaluate the needs of the DFLAW program and other Hanford Site missions to ensure the highest priority systems are addressed. In addition to a fast-approaching deadline for round-the-clock treatment operations, RL and MSA face another significant infrastructure challenge. As cleanup is being completed in a 220-square-mile area called the River Corridor, most of the cleanup operations going forward will occur in a 20-square-mile area in the center of the Hanford Site, known as the Central Plateau. Infrastructure systems are becoming more congested in an already overcrowded area. This paper/presentation will outline some of the challenges Hanford faces while executing infrastructure reliability projects. (authors)

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE W↗

System Health and Status Reporting is Used to Improve Infrastructure Systems at the Hanford Site - 20449

Reliable physical infrastructure systems are vital to completing the clean-up mission and the start-up and commissioning of new nuclear waste processing facilities at the Hanford Site. Key infrastructure systems at Hanford include water, sewer, and electrical utilities, roads, telecommunications/network systems, and fire systems. All of the infrastructure systems are non-nuclear, General Service systems that are being maintained under formal engineering configuration control and none are specifically credited in any documented safety analysis (DSA). Starting in calendar year 2017, the Hanford Site's infrastructure and services contractor started producing system health and status reports for a total of 15 critical infrastructure systems as means to get a better understanding of each system's health and how it could be improved to ensure better and more reliable service delivery. As the reporting, tracking, and use of the metrics has matured, the number of systems for which reports are being developed has been expanded to a total of 23. Each of the critical infrastructure systems are assigned primary and alternate design authorities that complete qualifications on each assigned system. The design authorities actively manage and maintain configuration control on each of their systems and track metrics associated with availability, maintenance (corrective and preventive), and configuration of the technical baseline. The metrics are based on the principles established in Chapter V of DOE O 420.1C, Facility Safety, [1] and have been tailored as appropriate to each of the key infrastructure systems. An overall assessment of system health is performed and documented on a routine basis (e.g., quarterly). Included in this documentation is a quantitative score for each of the metrics (i.e., availability, maintenance, configuration management) along with results of system walk-downs, description of any permanent design modifications, identification of new or emerging issues and vulnerabilities affecting the system, and an assessment by the design authority of actions necessary to improve the system health score. The overall status scores are calculated using a formula and based on a pre-determined grading scale, a color is assigned for simple presentation. The information gained from developing the reports is being used to (1) assist with making timely and better informed decisions through the use of solid technical bases that are increasing the overall reliability and capabilities of the Site's infrastructure systems as new expense and capital projects in the Reliability Projects Investment Portfolio (RPIP) are prioritized and executed; (2) feed the risk management program, and (3) integrate the technical content of Master Plans that describe the Site's needs for the system and the system's capabilities to meet those future needs. (authors)

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE W↗

Managing Tritium in Water.

Fermilab’s program to monitor and manage low levels of tritium in surface and sewer water on the laboratory site.

Fermilab, Fermilab↗

Utah FORGE 3-2418: Wellbore Fracture Imaging Using Inflow Detection - 2024 Annual Workshop Presentation

This is a presentation on the Wellbore Fracture Imaging Using Inflow Detection by Stanford University and Sandia National Laboratory, presented by Roland Horde. This is a video presentation on wells, both before and after stimulation, using chloride or other ions to map fractures and estimate their flow magnitudes. This research is being done by Stanford University. This presentation was featured in the Utah FORGE R&D Annual Workshop on August 13, 2024.

15 GEOTHERMAL ENERGY↗

Furthering Advancements to Shorten the Time (FAST) to Commissioning for Pumped Storage Hydropower (PSH) Prize: Cooperative Research and Development, CRADA Number CRD-19-00837 (Final Report)

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) initiated a Prize with support from Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), and sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy Water Power Technologies Office (DOE WPTO) to encourage ideas to reduce the time to commissioning for PSH projects. As a result, nine finalists have been chosen to develop their concepts in advance of the FAST Prize Pitch Contest to be held on October 7, 2019. The national labs will provide technical and business advisement to the noted FAST Prize finalists in preparation for this Pitch Contest.

13 HYDRO ENERGY↗