Search NASA⌕ Search

SEARCH · Search NASA

Results for “SITE PREPARATION”

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.

At least 19 records
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2018

How Successful Site Preparation Work at a Large, Commercial, Hazardous and Toxic Waste Site Can Benefit DOE Cleanup Projects - 18111

Jacobs recently completed site preparation work supporting the private commercial development of a world-scale petrochemical complex (an 'ethylene cracker' to produce the primary building block for many forms of plastic) in Monaca, Pennsylvania - the first major U.S. project of its kind outside the Gulf Coast region in 20 years and one of the largest (multi-billion dollar) construction projects in the eastern U.S. Prior to beginning construction on the petrochemical complex, the site's previous large, industrial zinc smelter operations had to be decommissioned and the facilities had to be removed. During the previous 80 years, the smelting operations at the site were used to produce zinc, lead, mercury, and sulfuric acid (a by-product of smelting). The smelting operations left landfills and industrial soil over a large area that had to be removed or closed under regulatory review to allow development across the 81,000 m{sup 2} (200-acre) industrial site located near a major river and local populations. In order to meet Pennsylvania's site-specific Land Recycling Program (commonly referred to as 'Act 2') legislative requirements, the direct contact pathway for landfill soil and slag was removed or mitigated. The site preparation work, or 'Early Works', started in January 2015. As the selected Early Works overall Engineering, Procurement, and Construction Management (EPCM) contractor, Jacobs performed the front end engineering and design. Subsequently, Jacobs had overall responsibility for procurement, construction management, health and safety, quality, security, and environmental services for the entire site and all contractors. The Early Works project included eight separate work scope packages: 1) Site Preparation, 2) Site Development, 3) Marine Works, 4) Rail Works, 5) Road Works and Offsite Utilities, 6) Site Security, 7) Construction Facilities, and 8) High Voltage Line Relocation. The Early Works scope was successfully completed in 2017. The challenges faced by this privately funded commercial project have much in common with large DOE and government construction projects. This paper explores lessons learned from the project and compares how project challenges were addressed on this private commercial project with those anticipated at large DOE/government construction and remediation sites, particularly those in the areas of Safety, Logistics, Infrastructure, and Stakeholder Involvement. The identification of best practices demonstrated on this successful project are shared for the purpose of bringing outside, commercial perspectives to ongoing or planned DOE/government construction projects. (authors)

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE W↗
DOE OSTI2013

Site preparation, forest, INW

Site preparation involves piling and/or burning of forest residues from harvest operations. To access the model referenced in the report, please visit https://www.netl.doe.gov/energy-analysis/details?id=51B70DD3-A095-4D0B-B0B8-D2612550836B

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2014

SECARB Permits for Seismic and Other Site Preparation Plan

The Southeast Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnership’s (SECARB’s) Anthropogenic Test is a demonstration of the deployment of CO 2 capture, transport, geologic storage and monitoring technologies. This project is one of the first and the largest fully integrated commercial prototype coal-fired carbon capture and storage projects in the USA. Drilled in January 2011, a deep characterization well provided geologic data confirming that the test site represented an attractive location for safe, long-term storage of CO 2 . Two Class V Experimental Injection Well underground injection control (UIC) permits were issued in November 2011 and subsequently the project’s injection wells were installed. A robust monitoring, verification and accounting (MVA) plan has been developed to monitor and track the CO 2 plume and the associated pressure field. The CO 2 MVA effort for the Anthropogenic Test CO 2 (Test) injection demonstration includes two wellbore seismic methods, specifically time-lapse Croswell seismic and vertical seismic profiles (VSP). Due to the unique challenges presented by this Test (injection depth of 9,500+ ft. into thin, stacked reservoir sands and limited injection volumes) surface seismic was eliminated as a Monitoring, Verification, and Accounting (MVA) tool. However, the newly drilled project wells provided ample casing diameters (prior to running tubing) to accommodate wellbore seismic receivers (wireline and tubing deployed) and a Croswell source.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2019

Site Preparation Integration and Operation of Mini-Sierra ART System

ATS platforms are some of the largest, most complex, and most expensive computer systems installed in the United States at just a few major national laboratories. This milestone describes our recent efforts to procure, install, and test a machine called Vortex at Sandia National Laboratories that is compatible with the larger ATS platform Sierra at LLNL. In this milestone, we have 1) configured and procured a machine with similar hardware characteristics as Sierra ATS, 2) installed the machine, verified its physical hardware, and measured its baseline performance, and 3) demonstrated the machine’s compatibility with Sierra ATS, and capacity for useful development and testing of Sandia computer codes (such as SPARC), including uses such as nightly regression testing workloads.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2018

Mercury Cleanup at the Y-12 Nuclear Security Complex - 18304

The Y-12 National Security Complex (Y-12) is one of the nation's most important national security assets. The facility played a key role in producing the world's first atomic bomb during the Manhattan Project and since World War II has been a vital contributor to America's nuclear deterrent capability. Historically, mercury was used extensively in operations at Y-12 in connection with production of components for nuclear weapons. During peak usage - from 1950 to 1963 - approximately 11 million kilograms of mercury were used. Over the years, large quantities of mercury - as much as 330,000 kilograms -- were lost within buildings and to soil and surface water. Today, mercury is considered the greatest environmental risk on the Oak Ridge Reservation and mercury cleanup is a high priority for the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (OREM). Remediation of Y-12 and East Fork Poplar Creek (EFPC) to mitigate the mercury risk is based on a phased, adaptive management approach. The approach to address surface water includes treatment actions in the short term and research and technology development to evaluate longer-term solutions in the downstream environment. A number of formidable challenges must be addressed in order to assure safe, effective cleanup of mercury contamination at Y-12 and in EFPC. In the long term, understanding how mercury moves in the EFPC system is essential to the development of new technologies and remedial options and strategies for mercury contamination in the creek. OREM has developed and is currently executing a Mercury Technology Development Plan to address these long term needs. As a major component of the short term actions, UCOR has completed the design of the Outfall 200 Mercury Treatment Facility. Outfall 200 is the point at which the west end Y-12 storm drain system discharges to Upper East Fork Poplar Creek (UEFPC). Outfall 200 is consistently the largest single source of mercury to UEFPC. Construction and operation of this facility is critical to reduce mercury in UEFPC, and operation of this facility will be required before demolition of mercury contaminated facilities can begin. Once operational, the Mercury Treatment Facility will have a treatment capacity of 3,000 gallons per minute (gpm), a storm water capture rate of 40,000 gpm, and two million gallons of storm water storage capacity. The headworks with transfer pipeline is designed to capture flow from Outfall 200 and move it to the treatment facility. A contract for construction of the Outfall 200 Mercury Treatment Facility is expected to be awarded in 2018. Early site preparation began in 2017. The early site preparation scope includes utilities relocation, small structure demolition and creek bank secant wall installation. Initial operation of the Mercury Treatment Facility is planned for 2022. (author)

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE W↗
DOE OSTI2017

Injections through skin colonized with Staphylococcus aureus biofilm introduce contamination despite standard antimicrobial preparation procedures

While surgical site preparation has been extensively studied, there is little information about resistance of skin microbiota in the biofilm form to antimicrobial decontamination, and there are no quantitative models to study how biofilm might be transferred into sterile tissue/implant materials during injections for joint spine and tendon, aspiration biopsies and dermal fillers (DF). In this work, we develop two in vitro models to simulate the process of skin preparation and DF injection using pig skin and SimSkin (silicone) materials, respectively. Using the pig skin model, we tested three of the most common skin preparation wipes (alcohol, chlorhexidine and povidone iodine) and found that during wiping they reduced the biofilm bacterial burden of S. aureus (CFU cm-2) by three logs with no statistically significant differences between wipes. Using the SimSkin model, we found that transfer of viable bacteria increased with needle diameter for 30G, 25G and 18G needles. Transfer incidence decreased as injection depth was increased from 1 mm to 3 mm. Serial puncture and linear threading injection styles had similar transfer incidence, whereas fanning significantly increased transfer incidence. The results show that contamination of DF during injection is a risk that can be reduced by modifying skin prep and injection practices.

60 APPLIED LIFE SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2016

Assembly, Test and Launch Operations for a Nuclear-enabled NASA Mission: Considerations that are Specific to Use of a Nuclear Payload

For more than five decades, Radioisotope Power Systems (RPS) have played a critical role in the exploration of space, enabling missions of scientific discovery to destinations across the solar system by providing electrical power to explore remote, challenging and extreme environments. In particular, RPS enable deep space missions where increased heliocentric distances reduce the ability of solar power to adequately meet spacecraft and instruments power requirements. Some previous notable missions that were enabled by RPS include Nimbus III, the Apollo Surface Experiments, the Pioneers 10 and 11, the Viking Mars Landers, Galileo, Ulysses, Cassini, New Horizons and Curiosity. The current operating set of missions that are enabled by RPS are Voyagers 1 and 2, Cassini, New Horizons, and Curiosity. The Multi-Mission Radioisotope Thermal Generator (MMRTG) is the current RPS used for missions. An enhanced version of this generator outfitted with higher efficiency thermoelectrics is under development for potential use in the future. Other previously deployed power systems include the Multi-hundred Watt Radisotope Thermo-electric Generator (MHW RTG) and the General Purpose Heat Source Radisotope Thermo-electric Generator (GPHS RTG). The common thread for all of these power systems is that they are fueled with Pu-238. The use of this unique isotope involves additional planning activities and requires specific actions when the devices are delivered to Kennedy Space Center (KSC), launch site, and incorporated into the assembly, test and launch operations (ATLO) process to ensure mission success, met safety and security challenges. It has been forecasted that the use of a nuclear reactor system is on the horizon. This system could be used for either specifically powering S/C propulsion system or for surface power use once the mission arrived at its destina-tion. Since a nuclear-fission-based system has never been handled or integrated into a spacecraft at KSC, this nuclear reactor system would potentially require further challenges that must be accounted for in the ATLO process. This paper will explain ATLO considerations for the recent RTG-enabled launches that have occurred and planned in the near future (Mars 2020 NASA mission). It will also describe where further challenges that need to be met for the placement of a nuclear reactor (either for propulsion or transportation for surface power use) onto a space mission. Specifically, the following topics will be addressed: • Approach for nuclear safety planning for nuclear material use and its transportation to launch site • Planning for security posture for nuclear materials at launch site • Preparation for transportation of the nuclear power system from the fueling/testing location to the launch site • Preparation of documentation and procedures for nuclear material use at launch site • Planning for coordination between power system and space mission groups • Planning for appropriate staffing and scheduling of operations

07 ISOTOPE AND RADIATION SOURCES↗
DOE OSTI2024

Site Integration and Regulatory Considerations for a Nuclear Power Plant Colocated with Industrial Facilities: Colocation Studies for a Petroleum Refinery, Methanol Plant, and Wood Pulp Plant

This research explores the colocation of nuclear power plants (NPPs) with industrial applications. Three existing industrial sites were considered to demonstrate the siting process and illuminate technological gaps for future work. The three applications demonstrated for colocation here are a petroleum refinery, a methanol production plant, and a pulp and paper plant. This study uses a modified version of the EPRI siting criteria to explore the geological and demographic characteristics of the location of the current industrial site, as well as exploring external hazards from the industrial plant and its surrounding land use. Data was collected from public databases to estimate site characteristics. We then discuss how the site characteristics may impact the ability to colocate an NPP with an industrial application. The application site and 5 additional sites were explored for each application to give a general indication of the siting implications for an NPP in each area. The hazards for each industrial application was also explored to determine how colocation may impact reactor safety. The following gaps have been identified and should be explored in future research on colocation of NPPs with petroleum refineries, methanol plants, and pulp and paper plants: - There is a variety of industrial use, hazards, and pipelines in the surrounding area. A more thorough review of these hazards should be considered for colocation. - In general, the whole region around some applications seems to have softer soil, with implications for large site preparation costs. Further site investigations should prioritize looking into the geotechnical conditions. - Applications along coastlines are susceptible to flooding and hurricanes. The benefits of colocation should be weighed against the potential design implications. - The benefits of natural gas pipeline infrastructure in place should be explored further. If heat supply from the NPP is not required or not feasible due to the distance between the NPP and the application, there may be an opportunity to supply hydrogen to the plant through an existing pipeline. - Because there are several collocated industrial plants in the regions for the refinery and methanol plant, the benefits of sharing resources from the NPP should be explored further. This may open up additional sites for colocation. The following knowledge gaps were identified for the colocation of NPPs with these three industries, and industrial applications in general. These gaps are: - While the STAND tool contains many important characteristics for the reactor siting process, it is not calibrated for the colocation of NPPs with industrial facilities. - There are aspects of both the NPP and industrial application that need to be quantified for a siting analysis. Particularly, we need to understand the water intake requirements for NPPs and each application. - Further work may focus on adapting the STAND site comparison methodology to comparison of sites for co-location. This will involve using the data documented in this report as a starting point and performing a comprehensive and quantitative comparison. - Without spending significant resources, it would be impossible to gather data for each site to evaluate all aspects of siting. One approach to finding data and understanding its implications to siting is looking at FSARs for existing plants. For example, most sites considered in this study have small Vs30 values, indicating soft soil. However, there are NPPs located in the vicinity of most of the sites (e.g., Waterford Steam Electric Station near New Orleans) and reviewing available site characteristics and geotechnical data for these NPPs, might provide further information for siting. - The siting analysis in this study indicates that colocation of the NPP with the industrial site could be difficult based on external hazards, cooling requirements, weather, or population. We need to determine the impact of distance between the two facilities on cost and quality of energy transport. - This study did not touch on socioeconomic impacts for NPP colocation with industrial facilities. The input-output analysis methodology could be applied to the communities referenced in this study to determine the socioeconomic impact of these projects. - Similarly, the impacts of colocation on emergency planning was not explored in this study. The impacts on emergency planning infrastructure are somewhat related to the socioeconomic impacts, and could be explored using a similar methodology. - This study also did not address physical and cybersecurity, which will be important aspects of co-location [ref] . Cybersecurity will be important, regardless of the distance, but physical security will be important if the facilities are located very closely. Physical security might also be important for the steam lines between the plants, unless they are determined to be non-safety significant. - In many site l

08 HYDROGEN↗
DOE OSTI2025

Site Integration and Regulatory Considerations for an NPP Colocated with a Petroleum Refinery, Methanol Plant, and Wood Pulp Plant

This research explores the colocation of nuclear power plants (NPPs) with industrial applications. Three existing industrial sites were considered to demonstrate the siting process and illuminate technological gaps for future work. The three applications demonstrated for colocation here are a petroleum refinery, a methanol production plant, and a pulp and paper plant. This study uses a modified version of the EPRI siting criteria to explore the geological and demographic characteristics of the location of the current industrial site, as well as exploring external hazards from the industrial plant and its surrounding land use. Data was collected from public databases to estimate site characteristics. We then discuss how the site characteristics may impact the ability to colocate an NPP with an industrial application. The application site and 5 additional sites were explored for each application to give a general indication of the siting implications for an NPP in each area. The hazards for each industrial application was also explored to determine how colocation may impact reactor safety. The following gaps have been identified and should be explored in future research on colocation of NPPs with petroleum refineries, methanol plants, and pulp and paper plants: - There is a variety of industrial use, hazards, and pipelines in the surrounding area. A more thorough review of these hazards should be considered for colocation. - In general, the whole region around some applications seems to have softer soil, with implications for large site preparation costs. Further site investigations should prioritize looking into the geotechnical conditions. - Applications along coastlines are susceptible to flooding and hurricanes. The benefits of colocation should be weighed against the potential design implications. - The benefits of natural gas pipeline infrastructure in place should be explored further. If heat supply from the NPP is not required or not feasible due to the distance between the NPP and the application, there may be an opportunity to supply hydrogen to the plant through an existing pipeline. - Because there are several collocated industrial plants in the regions for the refinery and methanol plant, the benefits of sharing resources from the NPP should be explored further. This may open up additional sites for colocation. The following knowledge gaps were identified for the colocation of NPPs with these three industries, and industrial applications in general. These gaps are: - While the STAND tool contains many important characteristics for the reactor siting process, it is not calibrated for the colocation of NPPs with industrial facilities. - There are aspects of both the NPP and industrial application that need to be quantified for a siting analysis. Particularly, we need to understand the water intake requirements for NPPs and each application. - Further work may focus on adapting the STAND site comparison methodology to comparison of sites for co-location. This will involve using the data documented in this report as a starting point and performing a comprehensive and quantitative comparison. - Without spending significant resources, it would be impossible to gather data for each site to evaluate all aspects of siting. One approach to finding data and understanding its implications to siting is looking at FSARs for existing plants. For example, most sites considered in this study have small Vs30 values, indicating soft soil. However, there are NPPs located in the vicinity of most of the sites (e.g., Waterford Steam Electric Station near New Orleans) and reviewing available site characteristics and geotechnical data for these NPPs, might provide further information for siting. - The siting analysis in this study indicates that colocation of the NPP with the industrial site could be difficult based on external hazards, cooling requirements, weather, or population. We need to determine the impact of distance between the two facilities on cost and quality of energy transport. - This study did not touch on socioeconomic impacts for NPP colocation with industrial facilities. The input-output analysis methodology could be applied to the communities referenced in this study to determine the socioeconomic impact of these projects. - Similarly, the impacts of colocation on emergency planning was not explored in this study. The impacts on emergency planning infrastructure are somewhat related to the socioeconomic impacts, and could be explored using a similar methodology. - This study also did not address physical and cybersecurity, which will be important aspects of co-location [ref] . Cybersecurity will be important, regardless of the distance, but physical security will be important if the facilities are located very closely. Physical security might also be important for the steam lines between the plants, unless they are determined to be non-safety significant. - In many site l

08 - HYDROGEN↗
DOE OSTI2013

Overview of Opportunities for Co-Location of Solar Energy Technologies and Vegetation

Large-scale solar facilities have the potential to contribute significantly to national electricity production. Many solar installations are large-scale or utility-scale, with a capacity over 1 MW and connected directly to the electric grid. Large-scale solar facilities offer an opportunity to achieve economies of scale in solar deployment, yet there have been concerns about the amount of land required for solar projects and the impact of solar projects on local habitat. During the site preparation phase for utility-scale solar facilities, developers often grade land and remove all vegetation to minimize installation and operational costs, prevent plants from shading panels, and minimize potential fire or wildlife risks. However, the common site preparation practice of removing vegetation can be avoided in certain circumstances, and there have been successful examples where solar facilities have been co-located with agricultural operations or have native vegetation growing beneath the panels. In this study we outline some of the impacts that large-scale solar facilities can have on the local environment, provide examples of installations where impacts have been minimized through co-location with vegetation, characterize the types of co-location, and give an overview of the potential benefits from co-location of solar energy projects and vegetation. The varieties of co-location can be replicated or modified for site-specific use at other solar energy installations around the world. We conclude with opportunities to improve upon our understanding of ways to reduce the environmental impacts of large-scale solar installations.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗
DOE OSTI2023

Status Quo of Heliostat Field Deployment Processes

Deployment of the solar field of a concentrating solar power plant is one of many factors that are integral to the success of a project. Knowledge transfer from outside the industry is limited due to the unique nature of heliostats, which redirect sunlight to a receiver with high precision while maintaining a high level of reflectivity. Moreover, learning from project to project can be limited due to the site-specific nature of projects, as the market includes several developers, each with their own unique design. In this paper, we discuss the state of the art in heliostat field deployment. We cover all the key aspects of deployment from project assessment to a fully functioning system, which include site selection, layout development, supply chain, assembly, site preparation and construction, calibration, and operations and maintenance.

concentrating solar power↗
DOE OSTI2016

Site-Specific Preparation of Intact Solid–Liquid Interfaces by Label-Free In Situ Localization and Cryo-Focused Ion Beam Lift-Out

Abstract Scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM) allows atomic scale characterization of solid–solid interfaces, but has seen limited applications to solid–liquid interfaces due to the volatility of liquids in the microscope vacuum. Although cryo-electron microscopy is routinely used to characterize hydrated samples stabilized by rapid freezing, sample thinning is required to access the internal interfaces of thicker specimens. Here, we adapt cryo-focused ion beam (FIB) “lift-out,” a technique recently developed for biological specimens, to prepare intact internal solid–liquid interfaces for high-resolution structural and chemical analysis by cryo-STEM. To guide the milling process we introduce a label-free in situ method of localizing subsurface structures in suitable materials by energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX). Monte Carlo simulations are performed to evaluate the depth-probing capability of the technique, and show good qualitative agreement with experiment. We also detail procedures to produce homogeneously thin lamellae, which enable nanoscale structural, elemental, and chemical analysis of intact solid–liquid interfaces by analytical cryo-STEM. This work demonstrates the potential of cryo-FIB lift-out and cryo-STEM for understanding physical and chemical processes at solid–liquid interfaces.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗