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WIPP: Lessons in transportation safety
As part of a future consent-based approach by the federal government to site new deep geologic repositories for nuclear waste, local communities and states that are considering hosting such facilities are sure to have many questions. Currently, the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico is the only example of such a repository in operation, and it offers the opportunity for state and local officials to visit and judge for themselves the risks and benefits of hosting a similar facility. But its history can also provide lessons for these officials, particularly the political process leading up to the opening of WIPP, the safety of WIPP operations and transportation of waste from generator facilities to the site, and the economic impacts the project has had on the local area of Carlsbad, as well as the rest of the state of New Mexico.
Dr. Andrew Kadak has been a member of the American Nuclear Society for 40 years. He is an ANS Fellow. Dr. Kadak is currently president of Kadak Associates, Inc., consulting on the decommissioning of nuclear plants and has served on safety review boards of various nuclear utilities. His diverse background includes nuclear plant operations, senior executive utility management, and teaching at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
Dr. Kadak has led license renewal of operating reactors, systematic evaluation of older plants to allow them to demonstrate compliance to new regulations, financial rate proceedings to assure adequate capital for safe operation, innovative fuel purchase agreements, high level nuclear waste disposal, and storage solutions. His technical background has allowed him to actively direct regulatory strategy dealing with reactor vessel embrittlement, safety analyses, boiling water reactor pipe replacements and how to manage aging nuclear plants.
Internationally, Dr. Kadak also served on the Senior Nuclear Safety Oversight Board of the Daya Bay Nuclear Power Stations in Guangdong Province, China, and participated in an IAEA inspection of the Onagawa Nuclear Power Station after the Fukushima nuclear accident.
Dr. Kadak was formerly President and CEO of the Yankee Atomic Electric Company (YAEC) that operated the Yankee Atomic Nuclear Power station. During his tenure there, he held project management positions supporting stations such as Vermont Yankee, Maine Yankee, and Seabrook station. He was Vice President of the Nuclear Engineering Services before becoming President and CEO.
He has served as a board and executive committee member of the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI) and the industry’s Advisory Committee on High Level Waste in addition to many nuclear industry committees such as Edison Electric Institute, the Electric Council of New England, and the Electric Power Research Institute. In 2005, Dr. Kadak was named by President Bush to serve on the U.S. Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board for two four-year terms.
From 1998 to 2010, Dr. Kadak was a Professor of the Practice in the Nuclear Engineering Department of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). His research interests include the development of advanced reactors, in particular the high temperature pebble bed gas reactor, space nuclear power systems, improved technology neutral licensing standards for advanced reactors and operations and management issues of existing nuclear power plants.
He holds a BS in Mechanical Engineering from Union College, an MS in Nuclear Engineering from Northeastern University (MBA) and his PhD, in Nuclear Engineering - Reactor Physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Read Nuclear News from July 1999 for more on Andrew.
