Penetrating Ionizing Radiation Levels Observed in the Lower Arkansas and White River Valleys of Arkansas

Environmental levels of penetrating ionizing radiation were measured in the lower Arkansas and White River valleys of Arkansas. Measurements of environmental gamma and cosmic rays were made using a portable high pressure ionization chamber. The surveyed area encompassed a large coal-fired industrial plant. Observed exposure rates ranged from 5.9 microRoentgens per hour (μR/h) to 13.4 μR/h. The average exposure rate for the region was 8.8 μR/h. This value corresponds to 77 millirem (mrem) or 0.77 milliSieverts (mSv) per year. In comparison, a prior state-wide survey reported an average dose equivalent rate of 78.2 mrem (0.782 mSv) per year in Arkansas

Joining techniques for fabrication of composite air-cooled turbine blades and vanes

Activated diffusion brazing studies of joining methods for composite air-cooled turbine blade and vane fabricatio

Investigations of the potential performance characteristics of selected contact lubricants for applications in miniature slip-ring capsules of the type used in ST 124 M stabilized inertial guidance platforms Final technical report, 27 Mar. 1968 - 30 Apr. 1970

Performance characteristics of liquid and solid lubricants for contacts of miniature slip-ring capsule

Mechanical properties and LOX compatibility of stainless steel-clad titanium prepared by explosive welding and vacuum deposition Final report

Tensile and fatigue properties and liquid oxygen compatibility of bilaminate stainless steel-clad titanium prepared by vacuum deposition and explosive weldin

Development of gas-pressure bonding process for air-cooled turbine blades

An investigation was conducted on the application of gas-pressure bonding to the joining of components for convectively cooled turbine blades and vanes. A processing procedure was established for joining the fins of Udimet 700 and TD NiCr sheet metal airfoil shells to cast B1900 struts without the use of internal support tooling. Alternative methods employing support tooling were investigated. Testing procedures were developed and employed to determine shear strengths and internal burst pressures of flat and cylindrical bonded finned shell configurations at room temperature and 1750 F. Strength values were determined parallel and transverse to the cooling fin direction. The effect of thermal cycles from 1750 F to room temperature on strength was also investigated

Borders and the Environment

Despite regular acknowledgement of the interconnectedness of global ecosystems, government policies at the national level focus on environmental problems within their borders. As a result, the level of public and private resources expended on environmental protection in rich and poor countries is dramatically different on both a per capita and an absolute basis. While this outcome is readily explained by the politics of environmental issues, in which voters reward governments for domestic expenditures but are skeptical of expenditures outside the jurisdiction, these differences mean that the total amount of environmental quality purchased across nations is lower than it could be. It means that some nations are purchasing small, expensive increments in environmental quality while large, low-cost increments in other jurisdictions are not purchased. By applying the principles of marginal analysis from economics, this Article demonstrates that this produces less total environmental quality and treats residents of rich and poor countries differently in a morally unacceptable way. The authors propose that governments provide more transparent cost and benefit information to allow public discussion of such differential treatment and to encourage environmental gains wherever most efficiently achievable

The Destructive Role of Land Use Planning

Is land use planning fundamentally different from other forms of central planning? If so, does that difference suggest that land use planning will succeed where other forms of central planning failed? We conclude that land use planning is not fundamentally different from other forms of economic central planning. Further, the working of the market economy, and the long-term success of America\u27s economy, is intertwined in the clear and certain rights and responsibilities generated by the common law of property. The complexity of the modem world does not diminish the need for private property; indeed, it strengthens its imperative. Returning to a feudal conception of property is bad for personal freedom, bad for civil society, and bad for the environment. The last part of the foregoing bears particular emphasis. Too often, defense of property rights is linked to a rejection of socially laudatory goals. Protecting property rights does not mean acquiescing in the destruction of the environment, the blighting of urban landscapes, or callous disregard for the suffering of others. Property rights, along with markets and the common law, make up an institution that is quite successful at not only allowing but facilitating such goals and has long been recognized as such. For example, historian Richard Pipes notes that early [Christian] church theoreticians saw property as \u27another disciplinary institution intended to check and counteract the vicious disposition of men. Our argument here is not that rights should be protected to privilege the few, but that the failure to protect property rights will not only impoverish the many but harm the environment as well. Note also that our argument is not simply that planning has been a tool of brutal totalitarian regimes, but that even a pure democratic system run by benevolent wise persons has deep flaws that prevent it from achieving its stated aims. In Part I we briefly describe the nature of common law property rights rules. In Part II we examine the corrupted form of property rights, which we label administrative property, developing today through application of the planning model to land use. In Part III we explore how common law property rights work better than the corrupted modern version for resolving the contemporary problems planning attempts to address

The Destructive Role of Land Use Planning

Is land use planning fundamentally different from other forms of central planning? If so, does that difference suggest that land use planning will succeed where other forms of central planning failed? We conclude that land use planning is not fundamentally different from other forms of economic central planning. Further, the working of the market economy, and the long-term success of America\u27s economy, is intertwined in the clear and certain rights and responsibilities generated by the common law of property. The complexity of the modem world does not diminish the need for private property; indeed, it strengthens its imperative. Returning to a feudal conception of property is bad for personal freedom, bad for civil society, and bad for the environment. The last part of the foregoing bears particular emphasis. Too often, defense of property rights is linked to a rejection of socially laudatory goals. Protecting property rights does not mean acquiescing in the destruction of the environment, the blighting of urban landscapes, or callous disregard for the suffering of others. Property rights, along with markets and the common law, make up an institution that is quite successful at not only allowing but facilitating such goals and has long been recognized as such. For example, historian Richard Pipes notes that early [Christian] church theoreticians saw property as \u27another disciplinary institution intended to check and counteract the vicious disposition of men. Our argument here is not that rights should be protected to privilege the few, but that the failure to protect property rights will not only impoverish the many but harm the environment as well. Note also that our argument is not simply that planning has been a tool of brutal totalitarian regimes, but that even a pure democratic system run by benevolent wise persons has deep flaws that prevent it from achieving its stated aims. In Part I we briefly describe the nature of common law property rights rules. In Part II we examine the corrupted form of property rights, which we label administrative property, developing today through application of the planning model to land use. In Part III we explore how common law property rights work better than the corrupted modern version for resolving the contemporary problems planning attempts to address

Agricultural Revolutions and Agency Wars: How the 1950s Laid the Groundwork for Silent Spring

This chapter from the book Silent Spring at 50 analyzes the 1950s struggle over US food policy between USDA and FDA and how that struggle set the stage for the impact of Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring. Using a public choice/interest group analysis, the chapter examines how the two agencies reacted to the large scale transformation of US agriculture and food production during and following World War II. Just as agriculture underwent a dramatic productivity revolution that changed the face of American farming, marketing, new home appliances, and increased participation in the labor force by women radically changed the kinds of foods Americans ate. The consumption of processed foods increased significantly, and, concomitantly, concern about the purity of those foods increased as well. These trends served as the backdrop for a struggle between FDA and USDA over multiple dimensions of agricultural policy, including pesticide regulation. Using the records of hearings held in 1950 and 1951, we explore how the competing interest groups involved used the issue in their larger struggle over control of regulation of processed foods. We then fit the struggle into Bruce Yandle’s “Bootleggers and Baptists” theory of regulation

Ethical and Strategic Issues in Decarbonization Policy

Policies that force non-fossil fuel energy result in increased reliance on the rapid development and deployment of batteries and other technologies to meet decarbonization goals set by the United States and other industrialized economies. This Article focuses on batteries, noting that key minerals come from corrupt or hostile countries. Many key finished products come from China, thereby making the U.S. and the European Union reliant on an autocratic regime. Using cobalt as an example, the Article considers its production and the U.S.’s unwillingness to shoulder its share of the environmental burden of mineral extraction or refining. Further, the U.S. is increasingly reliant on China for inputs with no good substitutes, raising questions about the desirability of such economic integration. Efforts to spur decarbonization more effectively are warranted and may be nudged along by the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022