Ernest Moniz
He was confirmed by the U.S. Senate in a 97-0 vote on May 16, and on Monday, Ernest Moniz will visit Oak Ridge National Laboratory for the first time as energy secretary.
Moniz will meet with the media at the Spallation Neutron Source.
A former under secretary of the U.S. Department of Energy, Moniz was sworn in as the nation’s 13th Secretary of Energy on May 21. [Read more…]
Pictured above is the proposed Uranium Processing Facility at Y-12 National Security Complex, with the administrative area in the front and the fortified section of the building in the rear. (Submitted image)
There are some “world-class engineering problems” to work through, but site preparation work has started on the giant new Uranium Processing Facility at the Y-12 National Security Complex, a project official said Thursday.
“We’re finally starting to make some traction,” UPF Federal Project Director John Eschenberg told several hundred people at the two-day Tennessee Valley Corridor National Summit at Y-12’s New Hope Center.
Eschenberg said the site prep work could last 18 months, and it will include work on power distribution and underground water lines as well as moving a section of Bear Creek Road to the north. Three contracts have already been awarded to East Tennessee small businesses. [Read more…]
Eric Cantor
Note: This story was updated at 12:35 p.m.
In his first visit to Oak Ridge, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor paid tribute to the national security and science work that has occurred here dating back to World War II, called for a continued emphasis on research and discovery, and touched on political topics including the controversial Keystone XL oil pipeline, unemployment, and the nation’s social safety net.
A Virginia Republican, Cantor said the U.S. House of Representatives last week passed the Northern Route Approval Act, allowing the Keystone XL pipeline to be completed. The bill declares that a presidential permit is not required to approve the section of the pipeline from Alberta to Nebraska, which crosses a national border. [Read more…]
Lamar Alexander
It’s been five years since U.S. Sen. Lamar Alexander called for a new Manhattan Project for energy independence, and during a Wednesday update, the senator said four “grand principles” should guide America’s energy policy.
The senator said his principles—which include research and development, free market forces, and cheaper, clean energy—would “end an obsession with taxpayer subsidies and strategies for expensive energy.” They would instead focus on “doubling research and allowing marketplace solutions to create an abundance of clean, cheap, reliable energy,” Alexander said during a Wednesday afternoon speech at the Tennessee Valley Corridor Summit in Oak Ridge.
The senator called for doubling research funding and ending long-term subsidies for “big oil” and “big wind.” [Read more…]
KNOXVILLE—Most people have experienced a long wait to see a doctor. Technology being developed through a new collaboration between the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, Y-12 National Security Complex, and Stanley Healthcare aims to cut down on wait times.
The three entities are developing an intelligent interactive dashboard that crunches data in real time to help managers determine how best to administer flow.
An official signing of a cooperative research and development agreement was signed during the Tennessee Valley Corridor’s National Technology Summit on Wednesday evening at the Y-12 National Security Complex’s New Hope Center in Oak Ridge. [Read more…]
Oak Ridge Associated Universities has awarded competitive research grants totaling $150,000 to 30 junior faculty from ORAU member institutions. The annual grants are made through the Ralph E. Powe Junior Faculty Enhancement Awards program that provides funds to enrich the research and professional growth of young faculty.
The recipients, each of whom is in the first two years of a tenure track position, will receive $5,000 in “seed money” for the 2013-2014 academic year to enhance their research during the early stages of their career. Each recipient’s institution also matches the ORAU award with an additional $5,000, making the total prize worth $10,000 for each winner. Winners may use the grants to purchase equipment, continue research, or travel to professional meetings and conferences. [Read more…]
Karren More
Karren L. More, a researcher at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has received the 2013 DOE Hydrogen and Fuel Cells Program R&D Award in recognition of her leadership of ORNL’s project on microstructural characterization of fuel cell materials and for her role as a subcontractor on multiple DOE-funded fuel cell research and development projects.
More’s experience with a variety of electron microscopy techniques has enabled unprecedented levels of characterization of a variety of materials used in catalysts, supports, ionomers, gas diffusion layers, and membranes. She has collaborated on numerous fuel cell durability and aging studies with other DOE national laboratories and leading manufacturers such as 3M, General Motors, Ballard, AFCC, Nissan, Nuvera, and UTC.
More works in the Materials Science and Technology Division.
Hua-Tay Lin
Hua-Tay Lin, a researcher at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has been selected to receive the 2013 Honor Medal of Aurel Stodola by the Slovak Academy of Sciences. Lin is being recognized for his research activities and significant contributions in sciences on high-temperature mechanical behavior of ceramics and composites.
Lin works in ORNL’s Materials Science and Technology Division.
Robertsville Middle School in Oak Ridge won best overall score and was recognized for being the top school in the eighth-grade level at the Tennessee Middle School Math Competition recently held at Pellissippi State Community College. Pictured from left to right are Mrs. Spurling (teacher), Quinn Bader, Logan Rumbaugh, Kaitlan Paine, Carinne Cheney, Abbey Greenhalgh, Andrew Whitus, Ben Kelley, Curtis Roberston, and Becky Hanaver. (Submitted photo)
More than 600 students from 40 area schools competed for the honor of being named the top middle school math students in East Tennessee.
The 2013 Tennessee Middle School Math Competition, now in its 13th year, was held recently at Pellissippi State Community College and was sponsored by Oak Ridge Associated Universities.
Farragut Middle School in Knoxville walked away with the No. 1 team ranking for the best overall score in both the sixth- and seventh-grade team categories. Robertsville Middle School in Oak Ridge took the No. 1 team ranking for the eighth-grade team category. [Read more…]
USEC Inc. announced Friday that it had not been able to conclude a deal for the short-term extension of uranium enrichment at the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Kentucky, and the company will begin ceasing uranium enrichment at the end of May. The Paducah plant is the only U.S.-owned and operated uranium enrichment facility in the United States. USEC, which has operations in Oak Ridge, leases the Kentucky plant from the U.S. Department of Energy.
“While we have pursued possible opportunities for continuing enrichment, DOE has concluded that there were not sufficient benefits to the taxpayers to extend enrichment,” said Robert Van Namen, USEC senior vice president and chief operating officer. “I am extremely disappointed to say we must now begin to take steps to cease enrichment. [Read more…]
The Majorana Demonstrator is being assembled and stored 4,850 feet beneath the earth’s surface in enriched copper to limit the amount of background interference from cosmic rays and radioactive isotopes. (Submitted image)
The Oak Ridge National Laboratory has begun delivery of germanium-76 detectors to an underground laboratory in South Dakota in a team research effort that might explain the puzzling imbalance between matter and antimatter generated by the Big Bang.
“It might explain why we’re here at all,” said David Radford, who oversees specific ORNL activities in the Majorana Demonstrator research effort. “It could help explain why the matter that we are made of exists.”
Radford, a researcher in ORNL’s Physics Division and an expert in germanium detectors, has been delivering germanium-76 to Sanford Underground Research Laboratory in Lead, S.D., for the project. After navigating a Valentine’s Day blizzard on the first two-day drive from Oak Ridge, Radford made a second delivery in March. [Read more…]
More than 2,800 transite panels will be removed from the remainder of the K-25 Building. (Submitted photo)
A federal cleanup contractor in Oak Ridge is removing exterior panels known as transite panels from the last part of the K-25 Building that is still standing.
K-25 was built to enrich uranium for atomic bombs during World War II and was once the world’s largest building under one roof. It’s been unused for decades and is being torn down.
Most of the mile-long former gaseous diffusion building, located at East Tennessee Technology Park, has been demolished. About two million square feet of the U-shaped building have been removed, according to a Thursday press release from UCOR, the cleanup contractor for the U.S. Department of Energy in Oak Ridge. [Read more…]
