ARCHIVE - EES Division Highlights/Accomplishments 2003

Archive

December 16, 2003

Goff and Valentine Invited Participants at Penrose Conference
Fraser Goff and Greg Valentine, researchers in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division, are participants in a Penrose Conference (sponsored by the Geological Society of America) to be held near Puebla, Mexico January 12-16, 2004. The focus of the conference is Neogene-Quaternary continental margin volcanism, with sessions ranging from basic volcanological research to prediction of hazards on affected populations.

Goff is a co-convener and panelist for the session "Gas compositions and flux measurements at Popocatepetl, Mexico, 1994-1998." He will discuss his research on the application of remote sensing techniques to measuring gas emissions from Popocatepetl volcano's recent period of activity.

Valentine is a panelist for a session titled, "Explosive silicic volcanism and sedimentation processes." He will discuss research associated with the triggering of large eruptions that result in caldera collapse.

http://tepetl.igeofcu.unam.mx/penrose/index.html

December 2, 2003

Los Alamos Successfully Defends ARMANDO Experiment
On November 18th, Thomas Kunkle and Christopher Bradley of the Geophysics Group in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division at Los Alamos successfully defended the containment plan for the ARMANDO sub-critical experiment to the Containment Review Panel (CRP); the plan is to be executed in March of 2004. There were very few comments or additions to the Los Alamos plan recommended by the CRP that is important for containing special nuclear materials in Los Alamos' stockpile stewardship experiments.

Fehler Named to Earthscope Panel
Dr. Michael Fehler of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division at Los Alamos was recently appointed to serve on the Downhole Monitoring technical panel for the San Andreas Fault Observatory at Depth, a component of EARTHSCOPE, which was recently funded through the National Science Foundation. Dr. Fehler joins other panel members representing several universities, Chevron/Texaco, and Japan. The web site for Earthscope is: http://www.earthscope.org/index.html

DOE Encourages Drillers to Think Small
The December 2003 issue of EXPLORER, published by the American Association of Petroleum Geologists, an international organization, features a comprehensive article on Los Alamos' microhole drilling technology using coiled tubing systems. Microhole technology is exclusively a Los Alamos development. The article states, "The impetus for microhole technology was the constantly shrinking economic viability of testing downhole tools in standard sized wells, according to James Albright with the Los Alamos National Laboratory." Dr. Albright is a researcher in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division's Geophysics Group. Albright also states, "We realized we needed to look at drilling fit-for-purpose holes. This has been an evolutionary versus revolutionary journey. If we had been forced to start with a revolutionary new drilling system based on new physics with an entirely new infrastructure the idea may have died on the vine. But we have been able to adapt existing technology." In April 2003, under DOE's sponsorship, Los Alamos microhole researchers organized a petroleum industry workshop to gather input on microhole technology; the workshop brought in 63 representatives from industry, government, and laboratories to identify the primary potential applications for microhole technology in an effort to focus new research in this area.

November 26, 2003

Los Alamos Develops New Theory for Mixing and Reactive Transport in Porous Media
Bruce Robinson and Hari Viswanathan in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division have adapted and extended the theory of micromixing, first introduced in the chemical reaction engineering literature, to the topic of reactive transport in groundwater (Robinson, B. A., and H. S. Viswanathan. Application of the theory of micromixing to groundwater reactive transport models, Water Resour. Res., 39(11), 1313, doi:10.1029/2003WR002368, 2003).

For all but the simplest linear kinetic and sorption models, the fate and transport of a reactive solute depends not only on the residence times of reacting molecules in the system, but also on micromixing, defined loosely as the small-scale mixing processes that brings reacting molecules into close proximity. Robinson and Viswanathan showed that local concentration variations, which are invariably averaged out in large-scale numerical models, and are nearly impossible to measure, matter significantly for some groundwater reactive transport systems. The theory developed demonstrates this concept, and provides a means for bounding the impact of micromixing on reaction in groundwater. The work provides a straightforward and practical way to investigate the importance of a phenomenon for which data are seldom available and whose impact on groundwater reactive transport models has heretofore not been studied in a systematic, bounding manner. The approach is general, and therefore may also find applications in other fields, including carbon dioxide sequestration, atmospheric chemical fate and transport, and chemical reactor theory.

Los Alamos Finds Evidence of Nitrates in Desert Landscapes
A University of California scientist working at Los Alamos National Laboratory in collaboration with researchers from the U.S. Geological Survey, New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, the University of Nevada, the University of Arkansas and Desert Research Institute in Reno, Nevada, has recently found evidence that there may be significantly more amounts of nitrogen, in the form of nitrates, than previously estimated in desert landscapes. The discovery of these vast subsoil nitrate reservoirs could have implications for groundwater quality in arid/semi-arid environments worldwide, as mobilization of the nitrates could adversely affect drinking water supplies.

According to Brent Newman, a scientist in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division at Los Alamos, "this discovery could have some significant implications for humankind. The discovery of the subsoil nitrate reservoirs could raise previous estimates of nitrogen soil and subsoil inventories by as much as 71 percent in warm deserts and arid shrub lands and up to 16 percent in global nitrogen totals. These large nitrate inventories could adversely affect water quality if the nitrate becomes mobilized by land use change, such as conversion of natural deserts and scrublands to irrigated agriculture, or by wetter climatic conditions. Nitrate also is an important nutrient and the finding of large nitrate inventories in the subsoil has important implications for understanding nutrient cycling in arid and semiarid ecosystems around the world."

In findings published in the November 7 issue of the journal Science, the team of scientists theorize that the nitrate reservoirs have been accumulating in subsoil zones of arid regions throughout the world over the last 11,000 years, during a period of geologic time called the Holocene Epoch, when the onset of arid Holocene climatic conditions and succession to vegetation requiring scant amounts of moisture triggered subsoil nitrogen retention.
http://www.lanl.gov/worldview/news/releases/archive/03-148.shtml

Yucca Mountain Tours NRC and ACNW
The Associate Director, Sher Bahadur, of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and members of the Advisory Committee on Nuclear Waste, the NRC, officials from Amargosa and Clark Counties, Nuclear Waste Projects Office, and the Nuclear Waste Task Force received a tour on November 18 of the Yucca Mountain Project. Dick Kovach and others from the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division conducted the representatives to several locations underground and discussions included an overview of the geology, the results of testing activities, the repository layout, and the stability of excavations.

Yucca Mountain Celebrates Star Status Under OSHA
The Yucca Mountain Project celebrated their attainment of Star Status (VPP) under the Occupational Safety Health Administration's Voluntary Protection Program On November 20. The Geotechnical Engineering and Research Group (EES-7) in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division coordinates and integrates testing activities at the Yucca Mountain Project, which is only one of 19 DOE sites that have been awarded this honor. The presentation was made at a breakfast for the staff and craft located in Area 25 of the Nevada Test Site (NTS). In Las Vegas, Nevada, the celebration was held at a local park with lunch provided. This award makes the YMP project one of two organizations in Nevada that have attainted VPP Star Status. The other is Wackenhut Services, Inc., that provides security for the NTS.

Los Alamos Participates in AFTAC Knowledge Base Delivery
The Air Force Tactical Air Command (AFTAC) is charged with monitoring nuclear testing worldwide and Los Alamos scientists in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division play an important role in developing the knowledge and techniques that allows AFTAC to accomplish its mission. AFTAC operates and maintains the current United States Atomic Energy Detection System (USAEDS) and installs additional seismic arrays to support national objectives. During the week of November 17, Los Alamos researchers participated in Knowledge Base Delivery 6.1 to AFTAC. The products included calibration and research products for stations of the USAEDS network that will improve Detection, Location, Event Identification, and Yield Estimation capabilities.

November 19, 2003

ZECA—Returning to Nature What Nature Gave Us
The December 2003 issue of Scientific American features research led by Hans-Joachim-Ziock of Los Alamos National Laboratory's Earth and Environmental Sciences Division and done in collaboration with team members Los Alamos' Materials Science and Technology, Chemistry, Engineering Sciences and Application, and Theoretical divisions. The research has resulted in development of a process that converts coal into hydrogen and subsequently electricity. To further the application of the Zero Emission process, Los Alamos researchers, in collaboration with a consortium of energy companies and research institutes, formed the non-profit Zero Emission Coal Alliance (ZECA) in 1999. The for-profit ZECA Corporation recently replaced the Alliance in 2001 and is now working on the design for a pilot plant that will produce electricity at efficiency levels of approximately 70 percent (twice that of current coal-fired plants). At the same time, the pilot plant will capture all of carbon dioxide produced has and provide zero emission of any pollutants to the atmosphere.

The process for zero emission coal would convert coal into methane, which in turn is reformed into hydrogen and calcium carbonate; the hydrogen goes to a fuel cell that generates electricity and the calcium carbonate is broken down into calcium oxide and carbon dioxide. The carbon dioxide gas could then be incorporated into a mineral (magnesium carbonate) and disposed of underground - returning the carbon to the solid earth and minimizing carbon dioxide loading of the atmosphere.

Texas Officials, NEI, and US Air Force Representatives Tour YMP
Tours were conducted on November 10 and 13 by Bruce Reinert of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division's Yucca Mountain Project (YMP) for officials from the South Texas Project Legislators, Texas Emergency Management and Highway Patrol, Texas Department of Public Safety, the Nuclear Energy Institute (a lobby group for the nuclear industry), and officials from the United States Air Force Security Special Program Oversight and Policy Programs.

The briefing included traveling about 2,700 meters underground to observe a test where electric heaters simulate canisters that are heating up the rock to provide scientists with information on how this heating affects the geology of the repository.

November 12, 2003

Yucca Mountain Tours Nuclear Waste Officials, Dartmouth, FEMA, and Japan
On October 27 and 28 Dick Kovach, Earth and Environmental Sciences Division's Yucca Mountain Project, toured representatives of White Pine County Nuclear Waste, a delegation from the Japanese Federation of Electric Power Companies, John Summers, Reporter for KLAS-TV Channel 8, Las Vegas, NV, the Regional Assistance Committee-Advisory Council (RAC-AC), Kenneth Chin, Chairman, RAC-AC for Radiological Emergency Programs/Dept. of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness and 26 members who are associated with FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency).

Bruce Reinert and Dick Kovach also toured the Wise Women Club, Dartmouth College's Associate Professor of Earth Science, Leslie Sonder, and 20 students from Dartmouth on October 29.

Tours were conducted on November 4 and 5 for Clark County, Nevada School District representatives and 40 individuals from Sun City Summerlin, Nevada. Reinert and Kovach conducted underground tours for 250 individuals supporting the fall "Open House" at Yucca Mountain.

Los Alamos Holds Valles Caldera Workshop
A workshop on lacustrine sediments, climate change models, and possible scientific drilling in the Valles caldera, New Mexico was held on October 22 and 23, 2003 in Los Alamos, NM. The Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics (IGPP) and the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division of Los Alamos National Laboratory sponsored the workshop. About 60 scientists from New Mexico and other locations within the United States attended the workshop to weigh the pros and cons of climate change studies at Valles.

The 22-km-diameter Valles caldera (c.a.1.2 Myr) is the world's type resurgent caldera and is host to a 280-C liquid-dominated hydrothermal system (Smith and Bailey, 1968; Goff and Gardner, 1994). The caldera also contains various lacustrine sediments and hydromagmatic deposits dating from the inception of caldera formation to roughly 50 ka. More recent bog deposits are also present. Many of these deposits are presumably buried within the caldera moat, and overlain and interbedded with post-caldera moat rhyolite eruptions. New geologic mapping at 1:24,000 scale shows that the best exposures of lacustrine rocks occur on the uplifted flanks of the central resurgent dome and as eroded remnants within the encircling valleys (Valle Grande, Valle Toledo, Valle San Antonio).

Contact: Fraser Goff, Jeffrey M. Heikoop, Giday WoldeGabriel, and Julianna Fessenden-Rahn; EES-6, MS D462, Los Alamos National Laboratory, New Mexico 87545 fraser@lanl.gov,3 jheikoop@lanl.gov, wgiday@lanl.gov, and fessende@lanl.gov

Los Alamos Hosts GIS Open House
On November 19, 2003, Los Alamos will be holding a Geographic Information Systems (GIS) Day open house on the second floor of the Study Center at Los Alamos National Laboratory from 9:00 AM to 4:30 PM. All U.S. citizens and foreign nationals with a Los Alamos badge are invited to attend.

Los Alamos' GIS Day open house will include an array of presentations, posters, demonstrations, and discussions to highlight how GIS is used in a range of Laboratory applications. GIS has significant and widespread uses in a number of existing programs and can be a major capability in new and developing programs. For example, the emergency operations team used GIS extensively during the 2000 Cerro Grande Fire to track the fire's movement. After the fire, analysts used GIS to analyze flooding and erosion risks and map the extent of fire damage.

October 28, 2003

Los Alamos Participates in NEON
The Savannah River Site hosted the first of three National Ecological Observatory Network - Southeast (NEON-SE) meetings on October 15-18. The meeting focus was to develop a proposal to the National Science Foundation for funding of the entire NEON program that was estimated at $350M if congress approves the budget; the bill is currently in committee.

Dr. Daniel Cooper of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division attended the first meeting where the kinds of questions, site development, and participants were discussed if NEON-SE is to be funded. A write-up of the science directions for this NEON site will be posted on a web site within several weeks.

Dr. Cooper presented Los Alamos' lidar applications for inclusion in the proposal and this will include spatially resolved scalars and fluxes that are now part of lidar's surface-atmosphere component and a high-resolution modeling component. Dr. Cooper was invited back for the second meeting on instrumentation for NEON, where he will introduce Los Alamos' Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy system as well as the lidars.

From this interaction, Los Alamos has a good chance of being included in the NEON-SE funding. In addition, two participants: Robert Mitchell of the Joseph Jones Ecological Research Center and Michael Binford of the University of Florida wish to form a consortium of universities to help get the lidar to their field site for a demonstration program. They also feel that having a carbon dioxide measurement lidar is of great importance and would view its development in a positive light.

Los Alamos Briefs Air Force on Tunnel Target Defeat
On October 21, 2003, Wendee Brunish, of the Earth and Environmental Sciences (EES) Division, and Earl Knight, Decision Analysis Division, briefed visiting Air Force Lt. Col. Hilton of the Air Force's Global Persistent Attack program on the Tunnel Target Defeat Advanced Concept Technology Development activities at Los Alamos. Brunish briefed the visitor on the EES's developed Geologic Assessment Methodology for Underground Targets, which produces three-dimensional geologic models for targets of interest with limited data sets.

On October 22, 2003, Brunish, and Knight, hosted Defense Threat Reduction Agency visitors, Mike Giltrud, Lt. Col. Tom Ward, Kent Goering (Advanced Research Applications) and George Slyer, (Northrup Grumman International Technologies). The visitors are sponsoring the Tunnel Target Defeat Advanced Concept Technology Development activities at Los Alamos and were briefed on our program direction and progress to date. The visitors were also briefed on EES's developed Geologic Assessment Methodology for Underground Targets.

Interagency Geotechnical Assessment Team Workshop in Washington
Ward Hawkins of the Earth & Environmental Sciences Division participated in the Defense Threat Reduction Agency's, Interagency Geotechnical Assessment Team (IGAT) workshop on October 14 - 17, 2003 held in Alexandria, VA. The IGAT provides support to STRATCOM and others in the form of site-specific and regional geological characterizations. Hawkins is a member of the IGAT steering committee.

Los Alamos' ARM Dedicates Climate Change Kiosk to North Slope Alaska
The Atmospheric Radiation Monitoring (ARM) Education and Outreach team in the Los Alamos' Earth and Environmental Sciences Division returned from a successful trip to the North Slope of Alaska (NSA) in October.

The team was led by Dr. Michael Ebinger, Acting Group Leader of the Atmospheric, Climate, and Environmental Dynamics Group and the Director of ARM Education and Outreach, and staffed by Marja Springer, and students Margo Bachman, Janet Lynch, Andrea Maestas, Tina Sommer, and Carrie Talus.

The main purpose of the trip was to dedicate the new interactive kiosk titled, "Climate Change: Science and Traditional Knowledge," now on permanent display at the I?upiat Heritage Center (IHC) in Barrow, Alaska. The kiosk is a unique opportunity for people to learn about the effects of climate change from an Iñupiat and a scientific perspective. The final product evolved through partnerships with many in the community in Barrow, including elders, whalers, scientists, and educators.

October 22, 2003

Nanos: Yucca Mountain Important in Establishing Good Track Record
The Yucca Mountain Program (YMP) New (fiscal) Year's All Hands Meeting was held at Fuller Lodge, Los Alamos, New Mexico on October 2. The Laboratory Director's Office hosted a reception after the meeting and it culminated in a visit and personal message delivered by Director G. Peter Nanos. Director Nanos congratulated the group and noted that the public has a very strong fear of anything nuclear and that it will require considerable education to convince them that nuclear facilities are safe.

In that respect, the work done at Yucca Mountain is the beginning of this confidence-building process. In the long run, the public must be convinced that nuclear energy is a clean and safe alternative to fossil fuel, and that nuclear energy is environmentally green.

Director Nanos foresees that this process will take a long time but that it will eventually be the direction in which our nation goes. Successes at YMP are important in establishing a good track record for nuclear energy by solving the problem of the disposal of nuclear waste.

The purpose of the meeting was to cap off the FY03 year by looking both backward and forward. In looking backward, the group assessed what went well and celebrated their triumphs as well as identified areas where improvements are needed.

Dr. Ardyth Simmons, Program Manager for Repository Science, in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division (EES), coordinated the meeting agenda and activities. She provided a vision for what lays ahead in FY04, including accountability models (new contract, more oversight, etc.), the working environment, what projects the team will focus on and the schedule of milestones.

The Acting Deputy Division Leader of EES, Dr. Craig Pearson, provided the introduction to the meeting. He noted that the Los Alamos YMP was highly successful in FY03, even in the face of unprecedented schedule demands, accelerated activities to support the Analysis Model Reports, Key Technical Basis Report, and the Technical Basis Report completion, as well as short responses to critical issues such as the License Support Network tasking.

Many of the Los Alamos employees went to extraordinary and even heroic efforts to meet deadlines, overcome unexpected obstacles, and provide the high-level scientific products that will be necessary for a successful License Application in December 2004.

The pace of the program is not expected to slow as we come into the final push to the License Application. He encouraged everyone to realize what an impact they have had on the Project and admonished those present to continue to supply the very best scientific input in FY04.

A major purpose of the meeting was to show appreciation for the hard work and successes of the past year. The Los Alamos participants on the YMP were presented certificates of appreciation from the Repository Sciences Program Office and a Director's-hosted reception followed the meeting.

DOE Fossil Energy Features Los Alamos' Microdrilling
A recent DOE web site states, ?The attraction of microhole drilling is the prospect of greatly reducing the cost of drilling shallow- and moderate-depth holes for exploration, field development, long-term subsurface monitoring, and to a limited degree, actual oil and gas production. If the costs of these activities can be reduced, oil and gas reservoirs that are uneconomic to produce today could become economically viable in the future.

In 2003, after earlier exploratory research principally conducted by the Los Alamos National Laboratory, the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Fossil Energy began placing additional emphasis on microhole technology. The Energy Department envisions microholes with diameters as small as 1 to 2 inches, from 1/25th to 1/50th the cross-sectional area of conventional wells.

Microhole technology is exclusively a Los Alamos development and programmatically resides in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division. The Los Alamos microhole drilling system is the culmination of theory, benchtop and field-testing, modification, and integration of commercially available components.

Drilling is accomplished through hydraulically driven, coiled-tubing-deployed, positive-displacement motors and rotary drill bits. Microholes serve the same purpose as wells drilled conventionally for infield or stripper production and do so at a greatly reduced cost.

http://fe.doe.gov/programs/oilgas/microhole/

Los Alamos Attends 215th Containment Evaluation Panel
On October 1st and 2nd, several members of the Geodynamics Team in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division (Wendee Brunish, Tom Kunkle, Ward Hawkins, David Coblentz and Chris Bradley) attended the Nevada Test Site (NTS) test readiness tour of the tunnel complex at NTS and attended the 215th Containment Evaluation Panel (CEP) meeting.

The tour of NTS was led by Dr. Byron Ristvet of the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) and included a tour of the big hole drilling complex/facility originated at NTS for the underground testing of nuclear weapons and a tour of P-tunnel, a Defense Nuclear Agency (formerly DNA now DTRA), facility for nuclear weapons effects tests.

On October 2nd, the CEP met to discuss its role in the National Test Readiness Program and the expected needs and capabilities should the nation return to nuclear testing. The United States Geological Survey presented the results of a newly designed big hole video logger and Tom Kunkle and Byron Ristvet (DTRA) presented an intelligence review of Foreign Testing to the CEP.

Dartevelle Receives Postdoctoral Appointment at Los Alamos
Sebastien (Seb) Dartevelle has agreed to start his postdoctoral appointment in the Geophysics Group of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division beginning in January 2004. Seb is a pioneer in numerical simulation of granular material flow, and his web site has garnered numerous awards. Seb's main project with his mentor, Kenneth Wohletz, will be numerical models concerning the response of geological materials to large and rapid deformations. He will also continue pursuing his novel approach to modeling explosive volcanism.

October 15, 2003

Los Alamos Hosts Valles Caldera Workshop on Paleoclimate Change and Scientific Drilling
The Institute for Geophysics and Planetary Physics in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division is sponsoring an interagency and interdisciplinary workshop that will focus on the possibilities of conducting scientific drilling, paleoenvironmental reconstruction/paleoclimate modeling, and other research on the well-preserved lacustrine deposits in the Valles Caldera, New Mexico. On October 22, a series of short talks on various topics will be held at the Fuller Lodge in Los Alamos, NM and a half-day field trip to the caldera on October 23 will examine some of the deposits. The remainder of the day on the 23rd will focus on discussing preliminary science needs, a modest drilling program, and funding options.
Contact: Fraser Goff, Giday WoldeGabriel, Jeff Heikoop, or Julianna Fessenden-Rahn, EES-6.

October 8, 2003

Los Alamos Completes Nation's First Microhole for Stripper Oil Production
A team in the Geophysics Group in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division, consisting of James Thomson, David Anderson, Donald Dreesen, and Jim Albright, completed the design and construction of the nation's first microhole for stripper oil production.

The microhole, having a total depth of 497 ft and hole and cased diameters of 2-5/8 in. and 2-1/8 in. respectively, was drilled and cased at DOE Rocky Mountain Oilfield Test Center (RMOTC) at Teapot Dome, Wyoming in September. RMOTC assisted Los Alamos by obtaining the necessary state drilling permit, preparing the site, and running casing. RMOTC personnel will perforate and hydraulically fracture the microhole prior to putting it on production late in November.

Microhole technology is exclusively a Los Alamos development. The Los Alamos microhole drilling system is the culmination of theory, benchtop - and field - testing, modification, and integration of commercially available components. Drilling is accomplished through hydraulically driven, coiled-tubing-deployed, positive-displacement motors and rotary drill bits. Microholes serve the same purpose as wells drilled conventionally for infield or stripper production but does so at a greatly reduced cost.

The demonstration at Teapot Dome demonstrates the ability to drill and complete microholes and significantly increases the economically recoverable reserves in the nation's depleted oil fields.

?Intergalactic Magnetic Fields? by Los Alamos' Kronberg Selected by Japanese for Parity
Philipp P. Kronberg, an astrophysicist and Orson Anderson Scholar at Los Alamos National Laboratory's Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division was notified that Maruzen Co. published his publication, ?Intergalactic Magnetic Fields,? in the Japanese magazine called Parity. The original publication in the December 2002 Physics Today was translated into Japanese and included by the Japanese editors in Parity.

Kronberg's work on magnetic fields ?spreads far beyond the galaxies that created them and they represent a significant, and only recently revealed, component of the cosmic energy budget.? Kronberg discusses topics such as Detecting astrophysical magnetic fields, Telltale synchrotron radiation, Background probes, Beyond clusters (Coma Clusters), Too strong too early, Intergalactic fields from stars, Supermassive black holes, Generators and accelerators, and Captured energy and cosmic history.

In the publication, Kronberg states, ?Unlike electromagnetic radiation from astrophysical sources, distant static magnetic fields are inherently difficult to detect. Nonetheless, recent measurements have begun to reveal that such fields exist at significant strengths, and on surprisingly large scales in the extragalactic universe. These discoveries present us with an important, previously unrecognized component of energy and force in the cosmos.?

Yucca Mountain Tours Schools, Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and EPA
Bruce Reinert of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division at Yucca Mountain toured a group of 40 individuals on September 29 and 30 from Saint Christopher Middle School and Shadow Ridge High School. Also attending the tours were Anthony Baratta, Atomic Safety and Licensing Board, from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and two representatives from the Environmental Protection Agency.

October 1, 2003

Publication Released on Seismic Recordings of the Carlsbad, New Mexico Pipeline Explosion
The August 2003 Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America published the results of the August 19, 2000, (BSSA, Vol. 93, p. 1427-1432) buried natural gas pipeline rupture and explosion that occurred in southeastern New Mexico. Authors are Keith D. Koper, Terry C. Wallace, and Richard C. Aster. Koper is from the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, Saint Louis University, Wallace is from the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division at Los Alamos National Laboratory (formerly of Department of Geosciences, University of Arizona), and Aster is from the Earth and Environmental Science Department at New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology.

The study concludes that, ?The seismic recordings of the natural gas pipeline accident in southeastern New Mexico provide source constraints that are unavailable from traditional investigative techniques.? The study further states, ?Such a large time between the two events implies that the source of the ignition was not sparking or heat produced by the pipeline rupture but more likely a heat source at the victim's campsite 100-200m away. This 24-sec time span also bears on the amount of punitive damages the pipeline operator is responsible for, since the victims were in a state of extreme distress during this time period. In many forensic seismology studies the seismic analysis give results that are important, but mainly in a corroborative sense. In contrast, in the case presented here the seismic constraints are unique with respect to all other sources of data and means of investigation.?

Dr. Terry C. Wallace, Jr. is currently the Acting Division Leader of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division at Los Alamos. He is a well-recognized and distinguished seismologist with broad knowledge in geosciences. He has authored or co-authored more than 80 peer-reviewed publications in many areas of seismology and tectonics, including ground-based nuclear explosion monitoring, plate tectonics, regional structure, and forensic seismology. He has a Ph.D. in Geophysics from the C
Los Alamos Names New Water Portfolio Manager

The Energy and Environmental Council of Los Alamos National Laboratory named Dr. Cathy Wilson as the new water portfolio manager. Wilson is a staff member in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division. The long-term objective of the water portfolio is to position Los Alamos National Laboratory as a national and international leader in solving water problems. Dr. Everett Springer, who was the original water portfolio manager, recently stepped down to accept a partial position in Science and Technology Based programs to work on the Los Alamos-University of California relations. Springer did an outstanding job in shaping and guiding Los Alamos' water programs and has helped to build partnerships with industry and explore the relationship between water use and energy production.

One of Dr. Wilson's first projects will be to conduct a new road mapping exercise for water. Development of the water road map is complex because there are many disparate water activities at the Laboratory and the scope of "water issues" is large. However, she has confidence that we can identify problems that fit both the Los Alamos National Laboratory mission and the unique skills of the Laboratory personnel.

Yucca Mountain Tours the Army's 3rd Battalion, 61st Air Defense, Department of Justice, National Regulatory Commission, and Others
Bruce Reinert of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division toured a group of 40 individuals from the Army's 3rd Battalion, 61st Air Defense on September 15. Tours were conducted on September 16 for attorneys from the Department of Justice that included: Ron Spritzer, John Bryson, and George Hellstrom, DOE Counsel.

A group of 25 from the Bechtel Women of Southern Nevada Group toured on September 17 and Richard Kovach toured individuals from the National Regulatory Commission on September 19 that included: Jon Peckenpaugh, Systems Performance Analyst, Alavanja Ridge, Nuclear Safety Intern, James Danna, Senior Systems Performance Analyst, Omid Tabarabai-Yazdi, Project Manager, Veronica Klein, Nuclear Safety Intern, Melanie Wong, Project Manager, and Paul Lohaus, Director, Office of State and Tribal Programs, Scott Flanders, Section Chief, Environmental & Low-Level Waste, Adrienne Lester, Environmental Scientist, Lawrence Kokajko, Branch Chief, Robert Kuntz, General Engineer, Jason Fleming, Nuclear Safety Intern.

Representatives from the US Army Corps of Engineers and Colorado School of Mines toured various locations in the underground to observe excavation techniques involving drill and blast verses a mechanical miner on September 23. Representatives from the Corps included: Stephen Brent Tatro, William James Harrison, James Paul Fast, John Ray Hess, and Teresa Ann Witt; Levent Ozdemir and Tibor George Rozgonyi, Colorado School of Mines, also were present on the tour.

Los Alamos Geophysicists Present Novel Wave-Equation Migration Methods
Lianjie Huang, Hongchuan Sun, and Michael Fehler of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division's Geophysics Group were in Houston on September 17-18 to discuss their recent work in seismic migration imaging. On September 17 they met with representatives of Core Labs and Sensorwise to discuss issues related to cross well imaging. They discussed work they have recently completed on a challenging dataset provided to Los Alamos by these two companies. This effort is an initial attempt to make a revolutionary change in our ability to image subsurface formations using crosswell data. On September 18, they ran an all-day meeting, hosted by Fairfield Industries, in which Los Alamos researchers made about six hours of presentations describing their work on wave equation migration imaging using surface seismic data. A total of 40 people representing 18 companies were present at the meeting. Topics presented included: (1) a new imaging condition that yields a normal reflection image, which can be more reliably interpreted to determine rock properties at an interface within the Earth; (2) offset-domain migration in which all shot gathers can be migrated simultaneously in a manner that is intended to be computationally faster than conventional shot-domain migration; (3) a novel approach for doing 3D migration that we call stationary-phase migration that provides better images than other approaches for offset-domain migration while maintaining the speed advantage of other methods; (4) developments in controlled aperture wave equation migration, which is a method for obtaining improved images in shot-record migration by limiting the portion of the subsurface for which each shot migrates; and finally (5) some work that Los Alamos researchers have been doing to image a large 3D Gulf of Mexico dataset using shot-domain migration. The visit produced excellent interactive discussions about Los Alamos' work and capabilities. The industrial participants indicated that Los Alamos' images are superior to those obtained using their own wave-equation migration methods.
alifornia Institute of Technology.

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