Department of Commerce April 19, 2024 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

With this interim final rule (IFR), the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) amends the Export Administration Regulations (EAR) to remove license requirements, expand the availability of license exceptions, and reduce the scope of end-use and end-user-based license requirements for exports, reexports, and transfers (in-country) to or within Australia and the United Kingdom (UK) to enhance technological innovation among the three countries and support the goals of the AUKUS Trilateral Security Partnership.

NMFS will hold a 3-day Atlantic Highly Migratory Species (HMS) Advisory Panel (AP) meeting in May 2024. The intent of the meeting is to consider options for the conservation and management of Atlantic HMS. The meeting is open to the public.

The Department of Commerce, in accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (PRA), invites the general public and other Federal agencies to comment on proposed, and continuing information collections, which helps us assess the impact of our information collection requirements and minimize the public's reporting burden. The purpose of this notice is to allow for 60 days of public comment preceding submission of the collection to OMB.

The U.S. Department of Commerce (Commerce) determines that imports of boltless steel shelving units prepackaged for sale (boltless steel shelving) from Malaysia are being, or are likely to be, sold in the United States at less-than-fair value (LTFV). The period of investigation is April 1, 2022, through March 31, 2023.

The U.S. Department of Commerce (Commerce) determines that boltless steel shelving units prepackaged for sale (boltless steel shelving) from Taiwan are being, or are likely to be, sold in the United States at less-than-fair value (LTFV). The period of investigation is April 1, 2022, through March 31, 2023.

The U.S. Department of Commerce (Commerce) determines that imports of boltless steel shelving units prepackaged for sale (boltless steel shelving) from the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (Vietnam) are being, or likely to be, sold in the United States at less than fair value (LTFV). The period of investigation is October 1, 2022, through March 31, 2023.

The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO or Office) proposes modifications to the rules of practice for inter partes review (IPR) and post-grant review (PGR) proceedings before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB or Board) that the Director and, by delegation, the PTAB will use in exercising discretion to institute IPRs and PGRs. The Office proposes these provisions in light of stakeholder feedback received in response to an October 2020 Request for Comments (RFC) and an April 2023 Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (ANPRM). The proposals enhance and build on existing precedent and guidance regarding the exercise of the Director's discretion pursuant to the America Invents Act (AIA) to determine whether to institute an IPR or PGR proceeding with regard to serial petitions, parallel petitions, and petitions implicating the same or substantially the same art or arguments previously presented to the Office. The proposed rules also provide a separate briefing process for discretionary institution arguments and align the procedures for termination of proceedings pre- and post- institution.

NMFS announces the availability of the "Draft Supplemental Programmatic Environmental Assessment (SPEA) for Fisheries Research Conducted and Funded by the Alaska Fisheries Science Center." Publication of this notice begins the official public comment period for this SPEA. The purpose of this Draft SPEA is to evaluate potential direct, indirect, and cumulative effects of changes in research that were not analyzed in the 2019 Alaska Fisheries Science Center (AFSC) Programmatic Environmental Assessment (PEA), or new research activities in the North Pacific Ocean and marine waters off of Alaska. Where necessary, updates to certain information on species, stock status or other components of the affected environment that may result in different conclusions from the 2019 PEA are presented in this analysis.