[en] Since 1965 the Advisory Committee on Protection of the Sea (ACOPS) have been compiling statistics and other information on marine oil pollution in the waters around the British Isles. This data has been used widely by many organisations, including the International Maritime Organisation, the European Commission, the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, Scottish Office, Welsh Office and Local Authority Associations. This report presents the outcome of an 18 month study, the two principal aims of which was to ascertain long-term trends in the occurrences of smaller operational oil discharges and to identify potential performance indicators to help monitor the effectiveness of control and preventive measures, introduced progressively over the last 30 years. This report contains a number of tables, figures, data analyses and data-field reports. (UK)

[en] A one-step non-contact patterns transferring method is developed. Clear non-identical images with well-defined boundaries are simultaneously transferred to a substrate by -15 kV plasma immersion ion implantation through a patterned metal mask. The metal mask is 6 cm away from the substrate and no lens system has to be fabricated beforehand to the substrate. The ion focusing effect is observed reducing the line width of the pattern from 6 to 2 mm. Particle-in-cell simulation confirms that the ion focusing effect is caused at the pattern opening of the 1 mm thick mask.

[en] Full text: Adequate security is an essential concern in the transport of radioactive materials for all the stakeholders involved - the countries producing radioactive materials, the countries across which and to where the radioactive materials are transported, and the transport industry. Indeed, stringent security measures in the movement of radioactive materials have been in place for many years. Regulators have recognised that specific radioactive materials transported require special security controls and measures in order to prevent illicit use of such material. This need for protection is now even greater. No industry is subject to more stringent levels of security. The transport of radioactive materials has traditionally been subject to specific national protection measures, as shown for instance by a State reserving its right to oversee the security measures taken during the transport of such materials originating from or carried through its territory. To prevent theft of radioactive materials during transport, a wide range of protection measures, including access control, employee screening and coordination with local and national security authorities, involving security forces, have been developed. Some of these provisions have a direct and considerable impact on how transports are organised. While State sovereignty on security matters is appreciated, and since international transport of radioactive materials is a common practice, greater harmonisation of security measures within and between countries should be encouraged in the interest both of security and efficiency. For example, a security official at an international border crossing may interpret requirements on the ground in a different way from authorities at the centre. There appears to be a view among some potential transport service providers that the transport safety and security regulatory regimes are onerous or too complicated. It is the operator who experiences at first hand the differences of interpretation and approach, within and between national jurisdictions. There is a synergistic relationship between the regulator whose responsibility it is to ensure that materials are transported safely and securely, and the regulated - that is, those whose job is to transport the materials in accordance with regulation. One has no meaning in practical terms without the other. Regulation only exists because of the need to transport; transport cannot proceed if it is not done according to regulation. Each must take account the interests and responsibilities of the other. The World Nuclear Transport Institute (WNTI) represents 46 member companies drawn from a wide range of industry sectors, including major utilities, fuel producers and fabricators, transport companies, package producers, and the production and supply of large sources. Within WNTI, a sustaining shipments industry task force was set up to address the subject of denial and delay of shipments in a pro-active and positive way. Firstly, and importantly, we have sought on behalf of our industry members to support international efforts to address the issues of denial and delay. Exchanges have been initiated with port authorities in a number of countries. Meetings are organised with the insurance industry, maritime authorities and liner services. This paper will expand on the issues highlighted above and suggest ways forward for those who develop and implement the regulations and standards, and for industry which must comply with these regulations and standards. (author)

No abstract available

[en] A phasor-particle model for coupling between an automatching network and electrical plasma is developed. The external circuit consists of an automatching box and an ideal voltage source is described by phasor equations. The plasma is modeled by hybrid particle-in-cell ions and Boltzmann distribution of electrons. The chamber consisted of the radio frequency powered electrode and the grounded chamber wall is a good capacitor. The accumulated surface charges and the potential of the powered electrode are modified by the plasma in the proposed model. The amplitude and phase of the voltage/current of the external matching network are numerically simulated. The negative direct current bias voltage in an asymmetrical system is generated

[en] We present observations of a sample of 28 luminous infrared galaxies (LIRGs) from the IRAS Bright Galaxy Catalog. These galaxies were previously observed by Goldader et al. using 2 μm spectroscopy on UKIRT. They found that stellar population synthesis models constrained by the spectroscopic diagnostics implied star formation rates that accounted for their infrared luminosities, and there was also no spectroscopic evidence for 'buried' active galactic nuclei (AGNs) at 2 μm. To search for evidence of AGNs buried deeply in extinction we have supplemented the UKIRT spectra with Spitzer mid-infrared (5.2-38.0 μm) spectra. Using a variety of spectroscopic diagnostics we find that ∼50% of the sample shows some evidence for an AGN. We also find that the luminosity of about ∼(17 ± 4)% of our sample is probably dominated by emission from AGNs, and the remaining ∼(80 ± 4)% have luminosities dominated by starbursts. Since ∼50% of the sample shows some evidence of concurrent AGN and starburst activities this suggests that both AGNs and starbursts commonly coexist in the LIRGs' phase of evolution. The sample consists of galaxies that show no AGN signatures at wavelengths less than 2 μm, so it appears that at wavelengths below 2 μm extinction in these galaxies masks the detection of AGNs in these and other LIRGs.

[en] Owing to the nonconformal plasma sheath in plasma immersion ion implantation of a rod sample, the retained dose can vary significantly. The authors propose to improve the implant uniformity by introducing a metal mesh. The depth profiles obtained with and without the mesh are compared and the implantation temperature at various locations is evaluated indirectly by differential scanning calorimeter. Our results reveal that by using the metal mesh, the retained dose uniformity along the length is greatly improved and the effects of the implantation temperature on the localized mechanical properties of the implanted NiTi shape memory alloy rod are nearly negligible.

[en] A phasor-particle model has been developed to numerical simulated the radio-frequency (RF) capacitive coupling between an external matching network and a low pressure electrical plasma. Gauss's law was applied to the blocking capacitor in this model. Non-linearly current was observed flowing into the blocking capacitor. A new method of treating the blocking capacitor as a phasor element is developed such that identical current is flowing through the blocking capacitor. A big impact on the circuit voltages and currents are observed when simulating the asymmetric system by the new method. The proposed method can be applied to quasi-matching condition

[en] A hybrid protocol including particle-in-cell (PIC) ions and Boltzmann electron distribution is developed to simulate plasma immersion ion implantation (PIII) into an S-shaped bar inside a grounded cylindrical cage consisting of a mesh. A multiple-grid system with three cell confinements is adopted to achieve sufficient accuracy and acceptable computational time. The simulation results reveal that the implantation fluence distribution along the major curvature is more uniform than that obtained by conventional PIII.

[en] This report represents the first deliverable of the North Sea Basin Task Force, which Norway and the UK established in November 2005 to work together on issues surrounding the transport and storage of CO₂ beneath the North Sea. The North Sea represents the best geological opportunity for storing our CO₂ emissions away from the atmosphere for both the UK and Norway