Federal Register / Vol. 83, No. 171 / Tuesday, September 4, 2018 / Notices 44911 

MILLENNIUM CHALLENGE 

CORPORATION 

[MCC FR 18–10] 

Establishment of MCC Economic 

Advisory Council and Call for 

Nominations 

AGENCY: Millennium Challenge 

Corporation. 

ACTION: Notice. 

SUMMARY: In accordance with the 

requirements of the Federal Advisory 

Committee Act, MCC intends to 

establish the MCC Economic Advisory 

Council (‘‘The EAC’’), and is hereby 

soliciting representative nominations. 

The EAC shall serve MCC in a solely 

advisory capacity and provide advice 

and guidance to Millennium Challenge 

Corporation (MCC) economists, 

evaluators, leadership of the Department 

of Policy and Evaluation (DPE), and 

senior MCC leadership regarding 

relevant trends in development 

economics, applied economic and 

evaluation methods, poverty analytics, 

as well as modeling, measuring, and 

evaluating development interventions, 

including without limitation social and 

gender inequities. In doing so, an 

overarching purpose of the EAC will be 

to sharpen MCC’s analytical methods 

and capacity in support of continuing 

development effectiveness. It will also 

serve as a sounding board and reference 

group for assessing and advising on 

strategic policy innovations and 

methodological directions in MCC. 

DATES: Nominations for EAC members 

must be received on or before 5 p.m. 

EDT on October 15, 2018. Further 

information about the nomination 

process is included below. MCC plans 

to host the first EAC meeting in late 

2018. The EAC will meet at least one 

time per year in Washington, DC or via 

video/teleconferencing. 

ADDRESSES: All nomination materials or 

requests for additional information 

should be emailed to MCC’s Economic 

Advisory Council Designated Federal 

Officer, Brian Epley at MCCEACouncil@

mcc.gov or mailed to Millennium 

Challenge Corporation, Attn: Brian 

Epley, 1099 14th St. NW, Suite 700, 

Washington, DC 20005. 

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: 

Brian Epley, 202.772.6515, 

MCCEACouncil@mcc.gov. 

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The EAC 

will focus on issues related to the 

analytical products and strategy used as 

inputs to compact and threshold 

program development and decision 

making, on learning from MCC 

experience about program effectiveness 

and impact, and to reflect on the 

broader global development trends and 

context of MCC’s work. The EAC will 

provide advice, recommendations, and 

guidance from experts in academia and 

the international development 

community on the design and 

implementation of programs in a 

structured and integrated manner. The 

Vice President for MCC’s Department of 

Policy and Evaluation affirms that the 

creation of the EAC is necessary and in 

the public interest. The EAC is seeking 

members from a range of academic 

organizations, independent think tanks, 

and international development agencies. 

Members will be chosen to represent a 

diversity of expertise, background, and 

geographic experience. 

The EAC will provide advice to MCC 

on issues related to growth and 

development in low and middle income 

countries including: 

1. New perspectives on economic 

development; 

2. Innovative approaches to growth 

analytics; 

3. Innovations in program and project 

evaluation; 

4. Applied microeconomics and costbenefit analytics; 

5. Poverty and income dynamics; 

6. Social development and the 

economics of gender; and 

7. Other innovations in the field of 

development economics and evaluation. 

Additional information about MCC 

and its portfolio can be found at 

www.mcc.gov. The EAC shall consist of 

not more than twenty (20) individuals 

who are recognized experts in their 

field, academics, innovators and 

thought leaders, representing (without 

limitation) academic organizations, 

independent think tanks, international 

development agencies, multilateral and 

regional development financial 

institutions, and foundations. Efforts 

will be made to include expertise from 

developing countries, within the 

resource constraints of the MCC to 

support logistic costs. 

Qualified individuals may selfnominate or be nominated by any 

individual or organization. To be 

considered for the EAC, nominators 

should submit the following 

information: 

• Name, title, organization and 

relevant contact information (including 

phone and email address) of the 

individual under consideration; 

• A letter containing a brief biography 

for the nominee and description why 

the nominee should be considered for 

membership; 

• CV including professional and 

academic credentials; 

Please do not send company, or 

organization brochures or any other 

information. Materials submitted should 

total two pages or less, excluding CV. 

Should more information be needed, 

MCC staff will contact the nominee, 

obtain information from the nominee’s 

past affiliations, or obtain information 

from publicly available sources. 

All members of the EAC will be 

independent of the agency, representing 

the views and interests of their 

respective industry or area of expertise, 

and not as Special Government 

Employees. All members shall serve 

without compensation. The duties of the 

EAC are solely advisory and any 

determinations to be made or actions to 

be taken on the basis of EAC advice 

shall be made or taken by appropriate 

officers of MCC. 

Nominees selected for appointment to 

the EAC will be notified by return email 

and receive a letter of appointment. A 

selection team will review the 

nomination packages. The selection 

team will make recommendations 

regarding membership to the Vice 

President for MCC’s Department of 

Policy and Evaluation based on criteria 

including: (1) Professional experience, 

and knowledge; (2) academic field and 

expertise; (3) experience within regions 

in which MCC works; (4) contribution of 

diverse regional or technical 

professional perspectives, and (5) 

availability and willingness to serve. 

In the selection of members for the 

EAC, MCC will seek to ensure a 

balanced representation and consider a 

cross-section of those directly affected, 

interested, and qualified, as appropriate 

to the nature and functions of the EAC. 

Nominations are open to all 

individuals without regard to race, 

color, religion, sex, national origin, age, 

mental or physical disability, marital 

status, or sexual orientation. 

Dated: August 28, 2018. 

Jeanne M. Hauch, 

VP/General Counsel and Corporate Secretary. 

[FR Doc. 2018–19039 Filed 8–31–18; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 9211–03–P 

NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND 

SPACE ADMINISTRATION 

[18–066] 

Notice of Centennial Challenges CO2

Conversion Challenge Phase 1 

AGENCY: National Aeronautics and 

Space Administration (NASA). 

ACTION: Notice of Centennial Challenges 

CO2 Conversion Challenge Phase 1. 


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44912 Federal Register / Vol. 83, No. 171 / Tuesday, September 4, 2018 / Notices 

SUMMARY: This notice is issued in 

accordance with the NASA Prize 

Authority. Phase 1 of the CO2

Conversion Challenge is open, and 

teams that wish to compete may now 

register. Centennial Challenges is a 

program of prize competitions to 

stimulate innovation in technologies of 

interest and value to NASA and the 

nation. NASA envisions this 

competition having two phases with a 

total prize purse of up to $1 million. 

Phase 1 (the current phase) is the 

Concept Phase with a prize purse of up 

to $250,000 to demonstrate capabilities 

to develop technologies to manufacture 

‘‘food’’ for microbial bioreactors from 

CO2 and hydrogen molecules, with the 

ultimate goal of producing glucose. The 

initiation of Phase 2, a Demonstration 

Challenge with a prize purse of up to 

$750,000, is contingent on the 

emergence of promising submissions in 

Phase 1 that demonstrate a viable 

approach to achieve the Challenge goals. 

The official rules for Phase 2 will be 

released prior to the opening of Phase 2. 

NASA is providing the prize purse, and 

NASA Centennial Challenges will be 

managing the Challenge with support 

from Common Pool. 

DATES: Challenge registration for Phase 

1 opens August 30, 2018, and will 

remain open until 6:00 p.m. Eastern 

Time on January 24, 2019. 

Other important dates: 

February 28, 2019 Phase 1 Submission 

Deadline—no further requests for 

review will be accepted after this date 

ADDRESSES: Phase 1 of the CO2

Conversion Challenge will be executed 

at the participants’ facility or lab. 

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: To 

register for or get additional information 

regarding the CO2 Conversion 

Challenge, please visit: 

www.co2conversionchallenge.org. 

For general information on the NASA 

Centennial Challenges Program please 

visit: http://www.nasa.gov/challenges. 

General questions and comments 

regarding the program should be 

addressed to Monsi Roman, Centennial 

Challenges Program, NASA Marshall 

Space Flight Center Huntsville, AL 

35812. Email address: hq-stmdcentennialchallenges@mail.nasa.gov. 

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: 

Summary 

Future planetary habitats on Mars will 

require a high degree of self-sufficiency. 

This requires a concerted effort to both 

effectively recycle supplies brought 

from Earth and use local resources such 

as CO2, water and regolith to 

manufacture mission-relevant products. 

Human life support and habitation 

systems will treat wastewater to make 

drinking water, recover oxygen from 

CO2, convert solid wastes to useable 

products, grow food, and specially 

design equipment and packaging to 

allow reuse in alternate forms. In 

addition, In-situ Resource Utilization 

(ISRU) techniques will use available 

local materials to generate substantial 

quantities of products to supply life 

support needs, propellants and building 

materials, and support other In-Space 

Manufacturing (ISM) activities. 

Many of these required mission 

products such as food, nutrients, 

medicines, plastics, fuels, and adhesives 

are organic, and are comprised mostly of 

carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen 

molecules. These molecules are readily 

available within the Martian atmosphere 

(CO2, N2) and surface water (H2O), and 

could be used as the feedstock to 

produce an array of desired products. 

While some products will be most 

efficiently made using physicochemical 

methods or photosynthetic organisms 

such as plants and algae, many products 

may best be produced using 

heterotrophic (organic substrate 

utilizing) microbial production systems. 

Terrestrially, commercial heterotrophic 

bioreactor systems utilize fast growing 

microbes combined with high 

concentrations of readily metabolized 

organic substrates, such as sugars, to 

enable very rapid rates of bio-product 

generation. 

The type of organic substrate used 

strongly affects the efficiency of the 

microbial system. For example, while an 

organism may be able to use simple 

organic compounds such as formate (1- 

carbon) and acetate (2-carbon), these 

‘‘low-energy’’ substrates will typically 

result in poor growth. In order to 

maximize the rate of growth and reduce 

system size and mass, organic substrates 

that are rich in energy and carbon, such 

as sugars, are needed. Sugars such as DGlucose, a six-carbon sugar that is used 

by a wide variety of model 

heterotrophic microbes, is typically the 

preferred organic substrate for 

commercial terrestrial microbial 

production systems and 

experimentation. There are a wide range 

of other compounds, such as less 

complex sugars and glycerol that could 

also support relatively rapid rates of 

growth. 

To effectively employ microbial biomanufacturing platforms on planetary 

bodies such as Mars, it is vital that the 

carbon substrates be made on-site using 

local materials. However, generating 

complex compounds like glucose on 

Mars presents an array of challenges. 

While sugar-based substrates are 

inexpensively made in bulk on Earth 

from plant biomass, this approach is 

currently not feasible in space. 

Alternatively, current physicochemical 

processes such as photo/electrochemical 

and thermal catalytic systems are able to 

make smaller organic compounds such 

as methane, formate, acetate and some 

alcohols from CO2; however, these 

systems have not been developed to 

make more complex organic molecules, 

such as sugars, primarily because of 

difficult technical challenges combined 

with the low cost of obtaining sugars 

from alternate methods on Earth. Novel 

research and development is required to 

create the physicochemical systems 

required to directly make more complex 

molecules from CO2 in space 

environments. It is hoped that 

advancements in the generation of 

suitable microbial substrates will spur 

interest in making complex organic 

compounds from CO2 that could also 

serve as feedstock molecules in 

traditional terrestrial chemical synthesis 

and manufacturing operations. 

The CO2 Conversion Challenge is 

devoted to fostering the development of 

CO2 conversion systems that can 

effectively produce singular or multiple 

molecular compounds identified as 

desired microbial manufacturing 

ingredients and/or that provide a 

significant advancement of 

physicochemical CO2 conversion for the 

production of useful molecules. 

I. Prize Amounts 

Phase 1 of the CO2 Conversion 

Challenge total prize purse is up to 

$250,000 (two-hundred fifty thousand 

dollars) to be awarded to up to five (5) 

top teams. Up to five (5) top teams will 

be selected based on judges’ scoring and 

awarded $50,000 (fifty thousand dollars) 

each. 

II. Eligibility To Participate and Win 

Prize Money 

NASA welcomes applications from 

individuals, teams, and organization or 

entities that have a recognized legal 

existence and structure under 

applicable law (State, Federal or 

Country) and that are in good standing 

in the jurisdiction under which they are 

organized with the following 

restrictions: 

1. Individuals must be U.S. citizens or 

permanent residents of the United 

States and must be 18 years of age or 

older. 

2. Organizations must be an entity 

incorporated in and maintaining a 

primary place of business in the United 

States. 

3. Teams must be comprised of 

otherwise eligible individuals or 


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Federal Register / Vol. 83, No. 171 / Tuesday, September 4, 2018 / Notices 44913 

organizations, and led by an otherwise 

eligible individual or organization. 

4. Teams must conduct their 

demonstration work in facilities based 

in the United States, to include AK, HI 

and U.S. territories. 

U.S. government employees may enter 

the competition, or be members of prizeeligible teams, so long as they are not 

acting within the scope of their Federal 

employment, and they rely on no 

facilities, access, personnel, knowledge 

or other resources that are available to 

them as a result of their employment 

except for those resources available to 

all other participants on an equal basis. 

U.S. government employees 

participating as individuals, or who 

submit applications on behalf of an 

otherwise eligible organization, will be 

responsible for ensuring that their 

participation in the Competition is 

permitted by the rules and regulations 

relevant to their position and that they 

have obtained any authorization that 

may be required by virtue of their 

government position. Failure to do so 

may result in the disqualification of 

them individually or of the entity which 

they represent or in which they are 

involved. 

Foreign citizens may only participate 

through an eligible U.S. entity as: 

i. An employee of such entity, 

ii. A full-time student of such entity, 

if the entity is a university or other 

accredited institution of higher learning, 

iii. An owner of such entity, so long 

as foreign citizens own less than 50% of 

the interests in the entity, OR 

iv. A contractor under written 

contract to such entity. 

No Team Member shall be a citizen of 

a country on the NASA Export Control 

Program list of designated countries in 

Category II, Countries determined by the 

Department of State to support 

terrorism. The current list of designated 

countries can be found at http://

oiir.hq.nasa.gov/nasaecp/. As of July 12, 

2018, only 4 countries are in category II 

(Iran, North Korea, Sudan, and Syria). 

Please check the link for latest updates. 

A team-designated team lead shall be 

responsible for the actions of and 

compliance with the rules, including 

prize eligibility rules, by all members of 

his or her team. 

The eligibility requirements can also 

be found on the official challenge site: 

www.co2conversionchallenge.org. 

III. Intellectual Property 

Each application should reflect the 

anticipated ownership, use, and 

licensing of any intellectual property. 

The Team represents and warrants that 

the Entry is an original work created 

solely by the Team, that the Team own 

all Intellectual Property in and to the 

Entry, and that no other party has any 

right, title, claim or interest in the Entry, 

except as expressly identified by the 

Team to NASA in writing in the 

application. NASA claims no right, title, 

or interest to any such intellectual 

property solely as a consequence of the 

Team’s participation in the competition, 

including the winning of a prize. NASA 

reserves the right to share any 

submissions received with its civil 

servants and contractors, and reserves 

the right to approach individual 

participants about any future 

opportunities at the conclusion of the 

competition. 

IV. Official Rules 

The complete official rules for Phase 

1 of the CO2 Conversion Challenge can 

be found at: 

www.co2conversionchallenge.org. 

Cheryl Parker, 

NASA Federal Register Liaison Officer. 

[FR Doc. 2018–18925 Filed 8–31–18; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 7510–13–P 

NATIONAL ARCHIVES AND RECORDS 

ADMINISTRATION 

[NARA–2018–057] 

Records Schedules; Availability and 

Request for Comments 

AGENCY: National Archives and Records 

Administration (NARA). 

ACTION: Notice of availability of 

proposed records schedules; request for 

comments. 

SUMMARY: The National Archives and 

Records Administration (NARA) 

publishes notice at least once monthly 

of certain Federal agency requests for 

records disposition authority (records 

schedules). Once approved by NARA, 

records schedules provide mandatory 

instructions on what happens to records 

when agencies no longer need them for 

current Government business. The 

records schedules authorize agencies to 

preserve records of continuing value in 

the National Archives of the United 

States and to destroy, after a specified 

period, records lacking administrative, 

legal, research, or other value. NARA 

publishes notice in the Federal Register 

for records schedules in which agencies 

propose to destroy records they no 

longer need to conduct agency business. 

NARA invites public comments on such 

records schedules. 

DATES: NARA must receive requests for 

copies in writing by October 4, 2018. 

Once NARA finishes appraising the 

records, we will send you a copy of the 

schedule you requested. We usually 

prepare appraisal memoranda that 

contain additional information 

concerning the records covered by a 

proposed schedule. You may also 

request these. If you do, we will also 

provide them once we have completed 

the appraisal. You have 30 days after we 

send to you these requested documents 

in which to submit comments. 

ADDRESSES: You may request a copy of 

any records schedule identified in this 

notice by contacting Records Appraisal 

and Agency Assistance (ACRA) using 

one of the following means: 

Mail: NARA (ACRA), 8601 Adelphi 

Road, College Park, MD 20740–6001. 

Email: request.schedule@nara.gov. 

Fax: 301–837–3698. 

You must cite the control number, 

which appears in parentheses after the 

name of the agency that submitted the 

schedule, and a mailing address. If you 

would like an appraisal report, please 

include that in your request. 

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: 

Margaret Hawkins, Director, by mail at 

Records Appraisal and Agency 

Assistance (ACRA), National Archives 

and Records Administration, 8601 

Adelphi Road; College Park, MD 20740– 

6001, by phone at 301–837–1799, or by 

email at request.schedule@nara.gov. 

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: NARA 

publishes notice in the Federal Register 

for records schedules they no longer 

need to conduct agency business. NARA 

invites public comments on such 

records schedules, as required by 44 

U.S.C. 3303a(a). 

Each year, Federal agencies create 

billions of records on paper, film, 

magnetic tape, and other media. To 

control this accumulation, agency 

records managers prepare schedules 

proposing records retention periods and 

submit these schedules for NARA’s 

approval. These schedules provide for 

timely transfer into the National 

Archives of historically valuable records 

and authorize the agency to dispose of 

all other records after the agency no 

longer needs them to conduct its 

business. Some schedules are 

comprehensive and cover all the records 

of an agency or one of its major 

subdivisions. Most schedules, however, 

cover records of only one office or 

program or a few series of records. Many 

of these update previously approved 

schedules, and some include records 

proposed as permanent. 

The schedules listed in this notice are 

media neutral unless otherwise 

specified. An item in a schedule is 

media neutral when an agency may 

apply the disposition instructions to 

records regardless of the medium in 


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