ANS is committed to advancing, fostering, and promoting the development and application of nuclear sciences and technologies to benefit society.
Explore the many uses for nuclear science and its impact on energy, the environment, healthcare, food, and more.
Explore membership for yourself or for your organization.
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!
Latest Magazine Issues
Sep 2025
Jan 2025
Latest Journal Issues
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.
Utility Working Conference and Vendor Technology Expo (UWC 2024)
Diane Leopold is executive vice president and chief operating officer for Dominion Energy. She is the senior executive responsible for all the company’s operating segments and related construction functions.
Leopold oversees: Dominion Energy Virginia, a vertically integrated electric utility with generation, transmission and distribution assets providing electric service to about 2.7 million customer accounts in Virginia and northeastern North Carolina; Dominion Energy South Carolina, a natural gas and electric utility serving 1.1 million customer accounts; and Contracted Energy, consisting of Millstone Power Station, dozens of solar generating facilities with long-term power purchase agreements in nine states, and a renewable natural gas business.
Leopold joined Dominion Energy in 1995 and became an officer in 2004. She held a wide range of executive roles in operational, financial, and commercial areas throughout the company. She became Dominion Energy’s executive vice president and co-chief operating officer in December 2019 and assumed her current role in October 2020.
In addition to being on the board of directors of Markel Corporation, she currently serves on various industry, non-profit and community boards. She is on the boards of the Nuclear Electric Insurance Limited, GROW Capital Jobs Foundation, the Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation and World Pediatric Project. Leopold serves on the executive committee, board and is past-chair of the American Gas Association and is past-chair of the Interstate Natural Gas Association of America.
Leopold graduated from the University of Sussex in the United Kingdom in 1989 with a bachelor’s degree in mechanical and electrical engineering. She received a master’s degree in electrical engineering (energy conversion, power, and transmission) in 1993 from George Washington University and an MBA in 1998 from Virginia Commonwealth University.
Last modified June 25, 2024, 3:43pm EDT