ALBERT

Notes: Seeks to examine the important role commitment plays inimplementing TQM and the interrelationship between that commitment andthe role of training. In particular, considers the necessity ofmaintaining the energy and drive for quality within the system. Developsa model which is analogous to the energy within a chemical process. Theexisting status quo is altered through the influence of commitment totraining, communications, systems, and teams. These affect theorganizational culture which then reinforces further changes anddevelopments.

Notes: Two methods were used to approximate site-specific biodegradation rates of monoaromatic hydrocarbons (benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, and xylenes [BTEX]) dissolved in ground water. Both use data from monitoring wells and the hydrologic properties of the quifer to estimate a biodegradation rate constant that can be used in ground water solute fate and transport models. The first method uses a biologically recalcitrant tracer in the ground water associated with the hydrocarbon plume to normalize changes in concentration of BTEX under anaerobic conditions; attenuation of the tracer is attributed to dilution, sorption, and/or volatilization. Attenuation of BTEX in excess of the attenuation of the tracer is attributed to biodegradation, although other processes may affect the observed rate. The second method assumes that the plume has evolved to a dynamic steady-state equilibrium. A one-dimensional analytical solution to the advection-dispersion equation is used to extract the rate of attenuation that would be necessary to produce a steady-state plume of the configuration found at the site. Attention is attributed largely to biodegradation bacause the analytical solution removes the effects of sorption and dispersion and volatilization is assumed to be minimal.Neither method fully accounts for the effects of continuing dissolution of BTEX in the source area or nonlinear sorption. Therefore, the rats cannot be attributed fully to biodegradation, but still are useful for ground water contaminant fate and transport modeling. The methods were applied to a data set from a JP-4 jet fuel spill at Hill Air Force Base, Utah. In estimats along two seprate flow paths, natural attenuation rates for BTEX ranged form 0.006 to 0.038 day−1, with most rates near 0.02 day−1. The rate for benzene ranged from 0.025 to 0.038 day−1. The rates of attenuation of individual BTEX compounds as estimated by the two methods were in close aggrement. For an individual compound, the rate estimated using the second method was at most 36 percent greater than, but usually within 20 percent of, the rate estimated using the first method, suggesting that intrinsic bioremediation was the dominant process that attenuated BTEX.

Notes: : Average annual precipitation for the period 1961–1990 was estimated for a mountainous region in Montana with a Laplacian thin-plate spline (ANUSPLIN) and compared to a hand-drawn map. Input data included latitude, longitude, and elevation from a three-arc-second U.S. Geological Survey Digital Elevation Model of the Bozeman and Billings 1 × 2 topographic quadrangles and precipitation data at 96 stations. The two maps are similar in appearance. Digital comparison of the two maps with ARC/INFO's Grid tools shows that mean annual precipitation for the hand-contoured map is 22.9 inches and for the ANUSPLIN map is 23.7 inches. Of the 5,760,000 cells, 53 percent showed no difference between ANUSPLIN and hand-drawn maps; 19 percent showed a two-inch difference, and 28 percent showed more than 2 inches difference. Input data and model output at the same location are not different (standard deviation 1.77, p-value 0.76). Hand-drawn maps show two inches more precipitation during the 1961–90 period than during the 1941–1970 period. Similarly, measured data at 73 sites for the period 1961–1990 are on average 2.4 inches higher than the same stations during the 1941–1970 period. The difference is significant (p-value 〉 0.0001).

Notes: We review Sawford's [Phys. Fluids A 3, 1577 (1991)] second-order Lagrangian stochastic model for particle trajectories in low Reynolds number turbulence, showing that it satisfies a well-mixed constraint for the (hypothetical) case of stationary, homogeneous, isotropic turbulence in which the joint probability density function for the fixed-point velocity and acceleration is Gaussian. We then extend the model to decaying homogeneous turbulence and, by optimizing model agreement with the measured spread of tracers in grid turbulence, estimate that Kolmogorov's universal constant (C0) for the Lagrangian velocity structure function has the value of 3.0±0.5. © 1995 American Institute of Physics.

Notes: Between 1979 and 1997, successive Conservative governments sought to reduce the scale of public sector activity and to introduce competition in the provision of public sector services. A central feature of this policy was the introduction of compulsory competitive tendering (CCT). CCT was initially confined to blue collar services but, by means of the Local Government Act 1992, it was extended to white collar, professional services, including financial services. However, though potentially extremely significant, the support for and implications of such a policy are issues which have been inadequately researched. Because of this, research has been under-taken into financial services CCT and has included a questionnaire survey of 300 professionally qualified accountants employed in 17 local authorities in the North West of England, drawn from county councils, district councils and metropolitan authorities. The article presents the findings of the survey, with a particular focus on the views of accountants on CCT in general and financial services CCT in particular. In addition, it provides evidence that the CCT process, irrespective of views on CCT and its appropriateness for specific activities, has changed culture and attitudes in the case of local government finance professionals.

Notes: Studies of the prevalence and contents of codes of conduct in the private sector show that their use to define an ethical environment or culture, and their effective implementation, must be as part of a learning process that requires inculcation, reinforcement and measurement. Consequently, the public sector must realise it cannot look solely to formal codes to revive and sustain public sector values. Alan Doig is Professor of Public Services Management, and John Wilson is Principal Lecturer and Head of the Centre for Public Services Management, at Liverpool Business School, Liverpool John Moores University.

Notes: A multidisciplinary research team, funded by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Subsurface Science Program, initiated a field-scale bacterial transport study in a sandy aquifer on the coastal plain of Virginia in 1994. The purpose of the study was to evaluate the relative importance of hydrogeological and geochemical heterogeneity in controlling bacterial transport. Extensive geophysical and geochemical characterization of the site was accomplished using intact cores obtained during the construction of the flow field and in a nearby sand pit exposure of the sedimentary facies found in the flow field. Geophysical techniques, including ground penetrating radar and cross borehole tomography, were used to relate the depositional environment of the sand pit to the flow field as well as to produce a 3-dimensional depiction of the flow field to be used in modeling the site and the results of the injection experiments. The 30 m long flow cell consists of ground water production and injection wells, a tracer injection well, and 10 multilevel samplers screened every half meter from 4.0 to 10.5 m below ground surface. The organization that owns the field site required that only native microorganisms be introduced at the site, therefore, the injected bacterial strain was isolated from the indigenous community in the aquifer. Candidate strains were selected by a protocol that enriched for phenotypes of low adhesion and non-clinical antibiotic resistance which could be used to detect the organism on selective media. The bacteria were selected for low adhesion to site sediments so that they might be readily transported through the aquifer. For the field injection experiment detection and quantitation of the strain chosen by this screening process, PL2W31, was accomplished by isotopically enriching the cells with [13C]glucose. Forced gradient conservative (Br−) tracer tests were performed immediately prior to the bacterial injection experiment to provide a measure of non-reactive transport through the aquifer. The non-reactive tracer test indicated the presence of hydrogeological heterogeneities at the site that caused differential breakthrough of the tracer. Results from the bacterial transport experiment indicate that bacteria traveled the length of the flow field (4 m), but that the majority of the biomass injected was retained in the sediments between the injection well and the first multilevel sampler at 0.5 m. Preliminary bacterial transport models indicate that the observed behavior could be accounted for by the presence of two subpopulations within a single bacterial strain with differing transport properties.