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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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DOE OSTI2026

The future of subsurface monitoring: AEC’s breakthroughs in CCS technology

Carbon capture and storage (CCS) has emerged as a key solution in the fight against climate change. However, for CCS to succeed, it is crucial to ensure that the sequestered CO2 stays safely trapped underground. The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has emphasized the need for advancements in subsurface monitoring, measurement, reporting, and verification. Aside from caprock integrity failure, the other primary failure points usually involve defective cement in the casing annulus of wellbores or plugged and abandoned wells. In addition, many energy producers (e.g., oil and gas, geothermal) and storage and disposal operators (e.g., H2 and water) must deal with the same issue. Poorly placed or degraded cement can create pathways for gas or fluid to escape from casing annuli and in plugged and abandoned or orphan wells, posing environmental risks. Yet, a reliable and cost-effective way to monitor cement and well integrity over multiple decades is still unavailable. Traditional geophysical methods like 4D seismic imaging and surface-based electromagnetic monitoring lack the resolution and accuracy for detecting these types of failures (Vasco et al., 2022; Fawad and Mondol, 2021). Wireline logging is expensive to run continuously and is obtrusive to the operation. While fiber optics can potentially be a solution, its bulkiness can significantly compromise the cement's integrity. To address these challenges, the Advanced Energy Consortium (AEC) at The University of Texas at Austin’s Bureau of Economic Geology (the Bureau) has been pioneering research in subsurface monitoring using its portfolio of distributed autonomous microfabricated sensors for harsh subsurface environments since 2008. A class of these microsensors [System on a Chip (SoC)] can be mixed in cement and permanently placed without compromising the cement column; the sensors would then communicate with each other or a data acquisition (DAQ) master node. Another class of the AEC microsensors can be fully autonomous, with rechargeable micro-batteries capable of exceeding 100°C, flash memory, and, currently, a pressure and temperature sensor. They are designed to circulate in mud, geothermal fluids, U-loops, or pipelines. They can log data into memory and are unobtrusive to operations. Our team has been working on a multi-year DOE-funded project (DE-FE0031856)—supported by $2.95M in federal funding and $0.75M in cost-matching from the AEC—to demonstrate SoC sensor utility for CO2 leakage monitoring in CCS applications. This multi-institutional collaboration developed a novel sensing architecture utilizing radiofrequency (RF) microsensors embedded within the cement sheath. These sensors detect CO2 migration and are interrogated via a Smart Casing Collar (SCC).

58 GEOSCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2026

All Systems Go: Regional Collaborations for Scaling AEC Innovation: Preprint

The high and rising cost of preserving and delivering housing in the U.S. requires changes to existing practices of finance, design, and construction. Innovative methods such as industrialized construction could offer the means to address housing undersupply while reducing delivery costs, operational costs and material waste in the building industry, but they face challenges to success and to scale. Simultaneously, construction and cleantech innovators themselves face skepticism from the traditional entrepreneurial ecosystem such as incubators and accelerators while attempting to navigate systems level challenges. To respond to this need, various public and private sector stakeholders have launched initiatives to support innovative companies. These include nonprofits such as Terner Labs and Ivory Innovations offering curated programming to architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) startups; housing developers in Minnesota and California "bundling" multiple projects together to reach economies of scale with a consistent project team; public and private sector entities developing "catalogues" of pre-approved home designs in the U.S. and Canada. This exploratory paper documents several of these emerging ecosystem-development efforts to support innovative housing approaches, characterizing them by leading stakeholder and intervention strategy based on publicly available information. The paper finds that these initiatives share similar high level goals but vary in implementation, reflecting different stakeholder priorities, regional market and policy dynamics, and housing typologies. The early stage of these efforts offer limited data for comparing actual outcomes, but the paper highlights common qualitative themes and identifies opportunities for further research and potential coordination among these efforts.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
DOE OSTI1975

Nuclear Safety [Vol. 16, No. 1, January-February 1975]

Nuclear Safety covers significant developments in the field of nuclear safety. The scope is limited to topics relevant to the analysis and control of hazards associated with nuclear energy, operations involving fissionable materials, and the products of nuclear fission and their effects on the environment. Primary emphasis is on safety in reactor design, construction, and operation; however, safety considerations in regard to the entire fuel cycle, including fuel fabrication, spent-fuel processing, nuclear waste disposal, handling of radioisotopes, and environmental effects of these operations, are also treated. Table of Contents for this issue follows. Table of Contents for this issue follows. GENERAL SAFETY CONSIDERATIONS: 1 AEC Working Paper on Population Density Around Nuclear Power-Plant Sites Adapted by J. Ft. Buchanan, 8 Water-Reactor Safety-Research Information Meeting by Wm. B. Cottrell, D. O. Hobson, and G. D. Whitman; ACCIDENT ANALYSIS: 29 Burnout in Boiling Heat Transfer. Part I: Pool-Boiling Systems by A. E. Bergles; PLANT SAFETY FEATURES: 43 Radionuclide Behavior During Normal Operation of Liquid-Metal-Cooled Fast Breeder Reactors. Part 1: Production by C. A. Erdman and A. B. Reynolds; CONSEQUENCES OF EFFLUENT RELEASE: 60 The Control, Monitoring, and Reporting of Radioactivity in Effluents. Part 1: AEC-Owned Facilities by M. B. Biles and F. E. Coffman, 71 The Control, Monitoring, and Reporting of Radioactivity in Effluents. Part 2: AEC-Licensed Facilities by L. B. Higginbotham and J. T. Collins; OPERATING EXPERIENCES: 76 Incident at the Lucens Reactor by J. M. Miller, 79 IAEA Symposium on Experience from Operating and Fueling of Nuclear Power Reactors by William A. Pryor, 87 Recent Occurrences at Nuclear Reactors and Their Causes Compiled by William R. Casto, 98 Summary of Operating U. S. Power Reactors as of Nov. 1. 1974, 101 Selected Safety-Related Occurrences Reported in September and October 1974 Compiled by William R. Casto; CURRENT EVENTS: 104 General Administrative Activities Compiled by Wm. B. Cottrell, 110 Action on Power-Reactor Projects Undergoing Regulatory Review or Consideration Compiled by Wm. B. Cottrell, 119 Action on Nonreactor Projects Undergoing Regulatory Review or Consideration Compiled by Wm. B. Cottrell, 121 Proposed Rule Changes as of Oct. 31, 1974; MISCELLANY: 97 ASTM—Euratom Symposium on Radiation Dosimetry: Developments and Standardization (Announcement), 118 Workshops on In-Pile Filter Testing (Announcement), 119 IAEA Symposium on Radiological Impacts from Releases from Nuclear Facilities into Aquatic Environments (Announcement).

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS↗
DOE OSTI2025

Development and Validation of Smart Building Technology Modules for Academic and Professional Education (Final Technical Report)

Smart building technologies can improve building energy efficiency and resilience, reduce carbon emissions, and provide load flexibility to the grid. However, in both college curricula and building professionals’ continuing education, there is a lack of systematic instruction on smart building technologies. Slipstream, partnering with Texas A&M University (TAMU), the Society of Building Science Educators (SBSE), and the National Institute of Building Sciences (NIBS), developed a semester-long smart building curriculum for college students and 16 training videos for building professionals and the general public. The education and training cover the drivers and benefits of smart building technologies, key building energy systems, the latest sensor technologies and IoT devices, and focus on topics related to smart building controls (i.e., energy management information systems, smart building control platforms, cybersecurity, grid-interactive-efficient buildings [GEBs], smart building control methods, and occupant-centric control). The smart building curriculum for college students was taught at TAMU in the Spring semester of 2024 as part of the validation process. Student feedback was collected and summarized in a validation report by TAMU. The curriculum material was also reviewed by SBSE faculty who are interested in teaching smart building technology-related courses. Suggestions on revisions and better adoption of the materials by other faculty across the architectural, engineering, and construction (AEC) domains were compiled in a distinct validation report by SBSE. The SBSE validation report was used to create structured subsets of the curriculum material for adoption at different levels in different sub-disciplines. These subsets are categorized and offered on the SBSE website (https://www.sbse.org/courses/Smart-Building-Technologies). The 16 training videos for building professionals and the general public were previewed by 17 industry experts, and feedback and suggested changes were incorporated into the final version of these videos. The videos are organized into a smart building technology training course and published on the Whole Building Design Guide website (https://www.wbdg.org/ce/doe/bto/sbtt), which is hosted by the National Institute of Building Sciences (NIBS). Project team members created marketing materials to promote the awareness of these free, publicly available education and training resources. Outreach and marketing activities included creating short promotional videos, building project webpages, making project announcements on social media, conducting an email campaign, and directly reaching out to faculties and building professionals. This report describes the project approach, provides outlines of the training materials, along with links to resources, and identifies lessons learned in creating the content. We also suggest ways to scale the instruction of smart building concepts to empower the workforce to accelerate the adoption of smart building technologies in the real world.

99 GENERAL AND MISCELLANEOUS↗
DOE OSTI1975

Nuclear Safety [Vol. 16, No. 2, March-April 1975]

Nuclear Safety covers significant developments in the field of nuclear safety. The scope is limited to topics relevant to the analysis and control of hazards associated with nuclear energy, operations involving fissionable materials, and the products of nuclear fission and their effects on the environment. Primary emphasis is on safety in reactor design, construction, and operation; however, safety considerations in regard to the entire fuel cycle, including fuel fabrication, spent-fuel processing, nuclear waste disposal, handling of radioisotopes, and environmental effects of these operations, are also treated. Table of Contents for this issue follows. Table of Contents for this issue follows. GENERAL SAFETY CONSIDERATIONS: 127 Quality Assurance in the Construction of Nuclear Power Plants by Sidney A. Bernsen, 141 1974 ANS Topical Meeting on Fast Reactor Safety by M. H. Fontana; CONTROL AND INSTRUMENTATION: 150 GBR-4 Protection Systems: Failures and Their Consequences by Peter Burgsmüller, J. J. Dekais, Albert Krähe, Raffaello Pignatelli, and Gottfried Vieider, 162 Standby Emergency Power Systems. Part 2—The Later Plants by E. W. Hagen; PLANT SAFETY FEATURES: 180 Radiotoxic Hazard Measure for Buried Solid Radioactive Waste by J. Hamstra, 190 The Thirteenth AEC Air-Cleaning Conference by D. W. Moeller, D. W. Underhill, and M. W. First, 203 Book Review: Nuclear Criticality Safety; CONSEQUENCES OF EFFLUENT RELEASE: 204 Environmental Radiation Effects of Nuclear Facilities in New York State by M. S. Terpilak and B. L. Jorgensen, 222 Book Review: Thermal Ecology; OPERATING EXPERIENCES: 223 Set-Point Drift in Nuclear Power-Plant Safety-Related Instrumentation Adapted by the Nuclear Safety Staff, 224 Diesel-Generator Operating Experience at Nuclear Power Plants, 227 Summary of Operating U. S. Power Reactors as of Jan. 1, 1975, 232 Selected Safety-Related Occurrences Reported in November and December 1974 Compiled by William R. Casto, 235 Recent Occurrences at Nuclear Reactors and Their Causes Compiled by William R. Casto; CURRENT EVENTS: 243 General Administrative Activities Compiled by Wm. B. Cottrell, 251 Action on Power-Reactor Projects Undergoing Regulatory Review or Consideration Compiled by Wm. B. Cottrell, 266 Action on Nonreactor Projects Undergoing Regulatory Review or Consideration Compiled by Wm. B Cottrell, 268 Proposed Rule Changes as of Jan. 1, 1975; MISCELLANY: 149 Course in Italy on High-Energy Radiation Dosimetry and Protection (Announcement), 250 Course at Northwestern on Safety of Light-Water-Cooled Nuclear Power Plants (Announcement), 266 Symposium of the Combined Effects on the Environment of Radioactive, Chemical, and Thermal Releases from the Nuclear Industry (Announcement), 271 Short Course on Engineering for Extreme Winds and Tornadoes (Announcement), 272 Three 1-Week Courses at MIT on Nuclear Power-Reactor Safety (Announcement), 272 Harvard University Short Courses (Announcement).

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS↗
DOE OSTI2025

Progress in Normalizing Flows for 4d Gauge Theories

Normalizing flows have arisen as a tool to accelerate Monte Carlo sampling for lattice field theories. This work reviews recent progress in applying normalizing flows to 4-dimensional nonabelian gauge theories, focusing on two advancements: an architectural improvement referred to as learned active loops, and the application of correlated ensemble methods to QCD with N f = 2 dynamical fermions.

Abbott, Ryan [Massachusetts Institute of Technolog↗
DOE OSTI2026

Variance reduction in lattice QCD observables via normalizing flows

Normalizing flows can be used to construct unbiased, reduced-variance estimators for lattice field theory observables that are defined by a derivative with respect to action parameters. This work implements the approach for observables involving gluonic operator insertions in the SU(3) Yang-Mills theory and two-flavor QCD in four space-time dimensions. Variance reduction by factors of 10–60 is achieved in glueball correlation functions and in gluonic matrix elements related to hadron structure, with demonstrated computational advantages. The observed variance reduction is found to be approximately independent of the lattice volume, so volume transfer can be utilized to minimize training costs.

Abbott, Ryan [Columbia U.; MIT, Cambridge, CTP; IA↗
DOE OSTI2024

Electrolyzer Supply Chain Readiness Level (SCRL)

The U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE's) Office of Manufacturing and Energy Supply Chains (MESC) is revitalizing the U.S. manufacturing base with over $20 billion of direct investment in manufacturing capacity, industrial decarbonization, and workforce development. This work will provide guidance to MESC and other government organizations as to which supply chain components to invest in to reduce material vulnerability for hydrogen electrolyzers as part of the Modeling, Mapping, and Analysis (MMAC) Consortium.

AEC↗