Federal Register / Vol. 65, No. 228 / Monday, November 27, 2000 / Notices 70757

Social Security numbers, and telephone

numbers.

The Committee’s sessions from 1:30

p.m. until 5:00 p.m. on Monday,

December 11, 2000, will be closed in

accordance with section 10(d) of the

Federal Advisory Committee Act (Pub.

L. 92–463). The agenda calls for

discussions of agency declassification

decisions concerning the Foreign

Relations series. These are matters not

subject to public disclosure under 5

U.S.C. 552b(c)(1) and the public interest

requires that such activities be withheld

from disclosure. The remaining session

of the Committee will meet in open

session from 9:00 a.m. through 11:00

a.m. on Tuesday, December 12, 2000, to

discuss transfer of Department of State

electronic records to the National

Archives and Records Administration

and the modernization of the Foreign

Relations series.

Questions concerning the meeting

should be directed to David Patterson,

Acting, Executive Secretary, Advisory

Committee on Historical Diplomatic

Documentation, Department of State,

Office of the Historian, Washington, DC,

20520, telephone (202) 663–1127, (email history@state.gov).

Dated: November 17, 2000.

David Patterson,

Acting Executive Secretary.

[FR Doc. 00–30141 Filed 11–24–00; 8:45 am]

BILLING CODE 4710–11–U

OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES

TRADE REPRESENTATIVE

Implementation of the Third Round of

Accelerated Tariff Eliminations Under

Provisions of the North American Free

Trade Agreement

AGENCY: Office of the United States

Trade Representative.

ACTION: Notification of articles proposed

for accelerated tariff elimination under

the North American Free Trade

Agreement.

SUMMARY: Section 201(b) of the North

American Free Trade Agreement

Implementation Act (‘‘the Act’’) (19

U.S.C. 3331(b)) grants the President,

subject to the consultation and layover

requirements of section 103(a) of the Act

(19 U.S.C. 3313(a)), the authority to

proclaim any accelerated schedule for

duty elimination that may be agreed to

by the United States, Mexico and

Canada under Article 302(3) of the

North American Free Trade Agreement

(‘‘the NAFTA’’). This notice is intended

to inform the public of the list of

products with respect to which the

United States has provisionally agreed

to accelerate the elimination of duties as

a result of the third round of

consultations with Mexico and Canada.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Kent

Shigetomi, Director, Mexico and

NAFTA Affairs, Office of Western

Hemisphere Affairs, Office of the United

States Trade Representative, Room 523,

600 17th Street, NW, Washington, DC,

20508; telephone: (202) 395–3412; fax:

(202) 395–9517. The list of products

with respect to which the United States

has provisionally agreed to accelerate

tariff elimination, as well as the lists for

Mexico can be obtained from the USTR

Internet Web Page, at www.ustr.gov

under [World Regions/Western

Hemisphere/North American Free Trade

Agreement/NAFTA Reports and

Publications].

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Article

302(3) of the NAFTA provides that the

Parties may consider and agree to

accelerate the elimination of customs

duties set out in their schedules.

Pursuant to this provision, on May 27,

1999, the Office of the U.S. Trade

Representative (‘‘USTR’’) published a

Federal Register notice (64 FR 28857)

soliciting petitions from interested

persons regarding products for which

accelerated tariff elimination would be

appropriate. For trade between the

United States and Canada, all duties

subject to tariff reductions were

eliminated on January 1, 1998.

Therefore, this acceleration round has

resulted in two parallel agreements, one

between the United States and Mexico

and another between Mexico and

Canada.

Section 201(b) of the Act authorizes

the President to proclaim such

modifications in NAFTA duty treatment

as the President determines to be

necessary or appropriate to maintain the

general level of reciprocal and mutually

advantageous concessions provided in

the NAFTA, subject to the consultation

and layover requirements of section

103(a) of the Act. Pursuant to section

103(a), a report has been submitted to

the House Ways and Means and Senate

Finance Committees that sets forth the

proposed action to be proclaimed, the

reasons therefore, and the advice

obtained from the U.S. International

Trade Commission (‘‘USITC’’) and

appropriate advisory committees. After

expiration of the 60-day consultation

and layover period, the President may

proclaim the proposed changes in

NAFTA duty treatment. In developing

the list of products proposed for tariff

acceleration, USTR considered the

advice of the USITC and consulted with

the appropriate private sector trade

advisory groups. As was the practice

under the prior NAFTA and United

States-Canada Free Trade Agreement

tariff acceleration processes, the United

States did not agree to provide

accelerated tariff elimination for any

products with respect to which the

domestic industry opposed tariff

elimination. The United States has

agreed to accelerated tariff elimination,

effective January 1, 2001, on the

products listed in the Annex to this

notice. These products currently are

dutiable when entered from Mexico

under the NAFTA. Each of these

products was considered during the

second round of tariff acceleration

discussions, but no agreement was

reached at that time. However, the

Governments agreed to continue

appropriate domestic procedures with

the goal of reaching agreement at a later

date (63 FR 32036). Such agreements

have now been reached on the products

listed.

Peter Allgeier,

Associate U.S. Trade Representative for the

Western Hemisphere.

LIST OF HTS SUBHEADINGS FOR WHICH THE UNITED STATES HAS PROVISIONALLY AGREED TO ACCELERATE ELIMINATION

OF DUTIES FOR NAFTA QUALIFYING GOODS OF MEXICO

2905.17.00 6402.99.18 6403.51.90 6403.99.40

2921.30.10 6403.19.10 6403.59.30 6403.99.60

6402.19.05 6403.19.30 6403.59.60 6403.99.75

6402.30.30 6403.19.50 6403.59.90 6403.99.90

6402.91.40 6403.40.30 6403.91.30 6405.10.00

6402.99.05 6403.40.60 6403.91.60 6405.20.30

6402.99.10 6403.51.30 6403.91.90 6405.20.90

6403.51.60 6403.99.20 6405.90.90

70758 Federal Register / Vol. 65, No. 228 / Monday, November 27, 2000 / Notices

1The final report on this research dated June

2000 is available on the OPS web site, http://

ops.dot.gov.

[FR Doc. 00–30138 Filed 11–24–00; 8:45 am]

BILLING CODE 3901–01–P

DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION

Research and Special Programs

Administration

[Cooperative Agreement DTRS656–00–H–

0004]

Quarterly Performance Review Meeting

on the Cooperative Agreement ‘‘Better

Understanding of Mechanical Damage

in Pipelines’’

AGENCY: Research and Special Programs

Administration (RSPA), DOT.

ACTION: Notice of meeting.

SUMMARY: RSPA has entered into a

cooperative agreement with the Gas

Research Institute (GRI) to co-fund a two

year research program to identify and

characterizing mechanical damage, the

leading cause of reportable accidents in

both gas and hazardous liquid pipelines,

using the technology of magnetic flux

leakage (MFL) oriented in the

circumferential direction on an in-line

inspection tool. RSPA along with GRI

invite the pipeline industry, in-line

inspection (‘‘smart pig’’) vendors, and

the general public to a quarterly

performance review meeting hosted by

RSPA to report on progress with the

research ‘‘Better Understanding of

Mechanical Damage in Pipelines.’’ The

meeting is open to anyone, and no

registration is required. This work is

being managed by GRI and performed

by Battelle Memorial Institute (Battelle),

along with the Southwest Research

Institute (SwRI). The meeting will cover

a review of the overall project plan, the

status of the contract tasks, progress

made during the past quarter, and

projected activity for the next quarter.

DATES: The quarterly performance

review meeting will be held on

Thursday, December 7, 2000 beginning

at 9 a.m. and ending around 1 p.m.

ADDRESSES: The quarterly review

meeting will be held in room 6244 of

the Department of Transportation

Headquarters Building, 400 7th Street,

SW., Washington, DC. Non-federal

personnel must enter the building

through the southwest entrance at 7th

and E Streets, SW., in order to receive

a temporary building pass.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:

Lloyd W. Ulrich, Agreement Officer’s

Technical Representative, Office of

Pipeline Safety, telephone: (202) 366–

4556, FAX: (202) 366–4566, e-mail:

lloyd.ulrich@rspa.dot.gov. You may also

contact Harvey Haines, Principal

Investigator, GRI, telephone: (773) 399–

8223, FAX: (773) 864–3495, e-mail:

harvey.haines@gastechnology.org.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

I. Background

RSPA has entered into a Cooperative

Agreement (Cooperative Agreement

DTRS656–00–H–0004) with the Gas

Research Institute (GRI) to co-fund a two

year research program to identify and

characterizing mechanical damage, the

leading cause of reportable accidents in

both gas and hazardous liquid pipelines,

using the technology of magnetic flux

leakage (MFL) oriented in the

circumferential direction on an in-line

inspection tool.

We plan to conduct public semiannual quarterly performance review

meetings for the duration of this

research. This meeting is the first semiannual one to be conducted to update

the public and interested governmental

parties on the research, such as pipeline

operators, vendors, RSPA technical and

regional staff and the National

Transportation Safety Board. Semiannual meetings in the future will be

held in conjunction with industry

meetings, such as the American

Petroleum Institute Pipeline Conference,

in order to reach a broad audience. We

want the pipeline industry and

especially that segment of the pipeline

industry involved with in-line

inspection to be aware of the status of

this research. The meetings allow

disclosure of the results to interested

parties and provide an opportunity for

interested parties to ask questions

concerning the research. Attendance at

this meeting is open to all and does not

require advanced registration nor

advanced notification to RSPA. Each of

the semi-annual meetings will be

announced in the Federal Register at

least two weeks prior to the meeting.

The quarterly performance review

meetings held between the semi-annual

meetings described above will be held

in conjunction with meetings of the

joint GRI/PRCI Technical Committee.

II. The Research

This research continues work that

DOT supported at Battelle to improve

In-Line Inspection NDE measurements

of mechanical damage and more closely

coordinates work that GRI is supporting

at SwRI to develop a critical assessment

criteria based on these NDE

measurements. This program extends

the work conducted under the DOTfunded contract ‘‘Detection of

Mechanical Damage in Pipelines’’

(Contract DTRS–56–96–C–0010) 1 by

looking at the circumferential magnetic

flux leakage field instead of the

traditional axial field and extends the

critical assessment criteria research to

work with full scale samples that are

being used for MFL measurements. The

goal of the research is to evaluate and

develop techniques for assessing

pipeline metal loss, mechanical damage,

and cracks using circumferential MFL.

These techniques are expected to

complement the techniques used for

axial MFL systems.

The research will extend the failure

assessment methodology for

mechanically damaged pipes to include

the influence of local cold working due

to the gouging/denting process on the

pipe’s remaining life. The program will

combine full scale tests and MFL

monitoring of pipes, laboratory tests and

elastic-plastic finite element analyses to

develop a validated methodology for

determining the remaining life of a

damaged pipe. The proposed SwRI

research will complement the work at

Battelle in developing MFL methods for

detecting and characterizing mechanical

damage.

III. Agenda for the Meeting

The following is the agenda for the

meeting:

‘‘Overview of DOT/GRI project for

finding and characterizing in-line

inspection for mechanical damage’’—

Lloyd Ulrich-DOT (15 min)

‘‘Project History and Impact of the InLine Inspection for Mechanical

Damage.’’—Harvey Haines-GRI (15

min)

‘‘Defect Manufacture and installation’’—

Tom Bubenik-Battelle (30 min)

‘‘Circumferential Magnetizer design and

construction’’—Bruce NestlerothBattelle (30 min)

Break

‘‘Non-Linear Harmonics Measurement

and test set-up’’—Al Crouch-SwRI (30

min)

‘‘Burst test Setup’’—Al Crouch-SwRI (10

min)

‘‘Tool Development for Implementation

in Actual Pipelines’’—Carl TorresTuboscope (30 min)

‘‘Wrap up and comments’’—Ulrich &

Haines (10–15 min)

Issued in Washington, DC on November 20,

2000.

Jeffrey D. Wiese,

Manager, Program Development, Office of

Pipeline Safety.

[FR Doc. 00–30053 Filed 11–24–00; 8:45 am]

BILLING CODE 4910–60–P