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Conference Spotlight
Nuclear Energy Conference & Expo (NECX)
September 8–11, 2025
Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
Standards Program
The Standards Committee is responsible for the development and maintenance of voluntary consensus standards that address the design, analysis, and operation of components, systems, and facilities related to the application of nuclear science and technology. Find out What’s New, check out the Standards Store, or Get Involved today!
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Sep 2025
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Nuclear Science and Engineering
September 2025
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
August 2025
Latest News
From operator to entrepreneur: David Garcia applies outage management lessons
David Garcia
If ComEd’s Zion plant in northern Illinois hadn’t closed in 1998, David Garcia might still be there, where he got his start in nuclear power as an operator at age 24.
But in his ninth year working there, Zion closed, and Garcia moved on to a series of new roles—including at Wisconsin’s Point Beach plant, the corporate offices of Minnesota’s Xcel Energy, and on the supplier side at PaR Nuclear—into an on-the-job education that he augmented with degrees in business and divinity that he sought later in life.
Garcia started his own company—Waymaker Resource Group—in 2014. Recently, Waymaker has been supporting Holtec’s restart project at the Palisades plant with staffing and analysis. Palisades sits almost exactly due east of the fully decommissioned Zion site on the other side of Lake Michigan and is poised to operate again after what amounts to an extended outage of more than three years. Holtec also plans to build more reactors at the same site.
For Garcia, the takeaway is clear: “This industry is not going away. Nuclear power and the adjacent industries that support nuclear power—and clean energy, period—are going to be needed for decades upon decades.”
In July, Garcia talked with Nuclear News staff writer Susan Gallier about his career and what he has learned about running successful outages and other projects.
Technical Session|Sponsored by MSTD
Wednesday, June 14, 2023|10:00–11:45AM EDT|Marriott 10
Session Chair:
Simon M. Pimblott
Alternate Chair:
Jake R. Quincey
Session Organizer:
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A Simple Modeling for Gas Release During Annealing of Irradiated Nuclear Fuel
10:00–10:20AM EDT
J. Losfeld (CEA), L. Desgranges (CEA), Y. Pontillon (CEA), G. Baldinozzi (CNRS)
Paper
Critical Analysis of Force Balance Approach for Departure Diameter Prediction with High-Speed Photography
10:20–10:40AM EDT
Juan Pérez (Univ. Puerto Rico, Mayagüez), Silvina Cancelos (Univ. Puerto Rico, Mayagüez)
Pressurized Water Reactor Control Rod Ejection Analysis Using PARCS, RELAP5-3D, and BISON for High Burnup Fuel
10:40–11:00AM EDT
Isabelle Lindsay (Univ. Tennessee, Knoxville), Mason Fox (Univ. Tennessee, Knoxville), Seokbin Seo (INL), Ryan T. Sweet (INL), Nicholas R. Brown (Univ. Tennessee, Knoxville)
Modeling and Measurement of Axial Gas Transport in Nuclear Fuels
11:00–11:20AM EDT
Chiara Genoni (INL), Kyle A. Gamble (INL), Fabiola Cappia (INL), Chase E. Christen (INL), Seongtae Kwon (INL), Kaustubh K. Bawane (INL)
BISON-Informed Whole Core TRISO Fuel Performance Modeling
11:20–11:40AM EDT
James B. Tompkins (Radiant Industries), Sebastian Schunert (INL), Roger Chin (Radiant Industries), Wen Jiang (INL), Ben Betzler (Radiant Industries)
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