Faculty and staff from Winthrop University recently toured the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site as part of a workforce development partnership.
Rishi Sunak, U.K. prime minister, announced plans this week to boost Britain’s nuclear workforce by 40,000 to support submarine building and developing other aspects of the nuclear energy industry.
“In a more dangerous and contested world, the United Kingdom’s continuous at-sea nuclear deterrent is more vital than ever,” Sunak said in a statement. “Today we usher in the next generation of our nuclear enterprise, which will keep us safe, keep our energy secure, and keep our bills down for good.”
More information about the government’s plans are laid out in the Defence Nuclear Enterprise Command policy paper.
The Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management announced the signing of a project labor agreement (PLA) between Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (OREM) contractor UCOR and North America’s Building Trades Unions (NABTU). The agreement, which allows for flexibility in wage increases and other incentives, is expected to help recruit and retain skilled construction trade workers at the DOE site in Tennessee.
Newhauser
Wayne Newhauser is a professor and the Charles M. Smith Chair of Medical Physics at Louisiana State University. Newhauser and Georgia Tech’s Shaheen Dewji—both longtime American Nuclear Society members—worked on a multiyear study that looked at workforce issues for six of the most important radiation professions.
An article authored by Newhauser and Dewji that looks in-depth at the study will be published at a later date in Nuclear News.
Newhauser sat down with NN editor-in-chief Rick Michal to talk about the study and its findings, published last year in the Journal of Applied Clinical Medical Physics.
The largest group of apprentices have started a journey to become production operators for the Savannah River Site’s liquid waste contractor.
The Department of Energy Office of Environmental Management’s liquid waste contractor at the Savannah River Site is giving nine college students the opportunity to jump-start their careers this year through a hybrid work program that allows them to finish their engineering or computer science studies while also interning at SRS.
A significant percentage of the workforce at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Reservation in Tennessee is eligible to retire in the next decade, according to the agency. In an effort to address the potential for a staffing shortage, UCOR, the DOE’s Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management contractor for cleanup activities at the site, is building a consortium with colleges and universities in the region. The collaboration aims to guide more students toward nuclear-applicable careers to build the next generation of workers for Oak Ridge and the nuclear industry at large.
Contractors at the Department of Energy’s Paducah Site teamed up recently to highlight career opportunities available at the site during the Paducah Area Chamber of Commerce WKY (West Kentucky) Launch Experience.
About 150 students attended the first ever Nuclear Connection Science Fair last week, held in Oxford, U.K., and hosted by Nuclear Waste Services (NWS) and Women in Nuclear (WiN UK).
Eight new hires from Savannah River Mission Completion (SRMC) are taking part in the new Liquid Waste Nuclear Operator apprenticeship class at Denmark Technical College in Denmark, S.C. The goal of the class is to prepare SRMC’s new employees for positions at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site, in South Carolina.
Doug Barber
Xcel Energy was the first utility to commit to carbon-free operations by 2050, with an 80 percent reduction by 2030. To achieve this important goal, we recognized that we would have to think and act in innovative ways. This mindset is highlighted in our approach to plant maintenance. In 2019, Xcel created a unique unified learning organization. This approach has leveraged nuclear and nonnuclear expertise and training resources to improve craft skills, address long-term equipment reliability vulnerabilities, implement strategic initiatives, and improve sharing of resources—all of which has improved plant performance.
Xcel Energy’s unique approach has been proven successful in back-to-back Institute of Nuclear Power Operations Maintenance and Technical Training renewals at each of its plants with strengths directly attributed to our unified enterprise and nuclear learning approach, which ensures a focus on nuclear excellence, technician effectiveness, and business efficiency.
The Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management cleanup contractor UCOR has increased its ability to recruit employees through a recent partnership with Tennessee’s Roane State Community College.
So far this year, Savannah River Nuclear Solutions Supply Chain Management (SCM) apprenticeship program has transitioned 12 new graduates to its team. According to SRNS, the apprentices and interns were attracted to the training program through new recruiting connections that SRNS has established with universities and colleges in the Aiken, S.C., area. The SCM program, which is designed to transition participants into full-time positions at the Savannah River Site, has recently increased internal incentives.
Through its Minority Serving Institution Partnership Program (MSIPP) and Tribal Education Partnership Program (TEPP), the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration has awarded five grants totaling $2.5 million to minority-serving institutions (MSIs) and tribal colleges and universities (TCUs).
The present size of the civil nuclear workforce in the United Kingdom is the largest it has been in the past 20 years. So reports the Nuclear Industry Association (NIA), the main trade association for the U.K. civil nuclear industry, in its recently released Jobs Map 2023. The London-based organization has released this report annually for more than a decade with the objective of giving the government the most up-to-date, accurate statistics on which to base economic and energy decisions. The NIA reports that the latest job growth has been fueled partly by projects on advanced and emerging nuclear technologies.
John Mobley IV
With the release of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Pathways to Commercial Liftoff: Advanced Nuclear report this past March, there have been considerable discussions as to the multifaceted roles and responsibilities of universities in this epoch of renewed interest in nuclear energy. In particular, the imperative of securing an estimated 375,000 additional individuals for the construction and operation of 200 gigawatts of advanced nuclear reactors by 2050 is a significant endeavor that is front of mind for educational practitioners and policymakers. An understanding that the challenges in meeting the projected workforce needs of the nuclear community rely on dynamic, responsive, and innovative solutions thus is contingent on enhanced recruitment, retention, and development. To this point, a threefold approach of (1) IDEA (inclusion, diversity, equity, accessibility) initiatives, (2) AGI (academia-government-industry) partnerships, and (3) gap analysis offers a promising avenue for addressing these issues.
The Department of Energy today announced a noncompetitive financial assistance cooperative agreement with Southeast New Mexico College, located in Carlsbad, N.M., for educational programs to enhance the knowledge, skills, and abilities of current Waste Isolation Pilot Plant employees while also building and training WIPP’s next-generation workforce.
Łukasz Młynarkiewicz (left), acting president of PEJ, and Krzysztof Zaremba, rector of the Warsaw University of Technology, signed an agreement on August 7 regarding the training of personnel for Poland’s nuclear energy program. (Photo: Warsaw University of Technology)
Polskie Elektrownie Jądrowe (PEJ), the state-owned firm set up to lead Poland’s efforts to establish a civil nuclear power program, signed an agreement yesterday with the Warsaw University of Technology to cooperate on the training of personnel for the nuclear sector.
The agreement provides for “substantive and research cooperation” as well as “cooperation in the development and implementation of scholarship programs [and] co-organization of competitions for scientific works or design competitions,” PEJ said in a news release. PEJ and the university will also work together on a curriculum to enable graduates to gain the knowledge and skills necessary to find employment in the nuclear energy field, the company added.
According to Poland’s Ministry of Climate and Environment, there are already some 80 companies operating in the Central European nation that provide services to nuclear technology vendors worldwide, with another 300 ready to join the nuclear supply chain.
Three college interns from the Savannah River Site were the keynote speakers at a recent Up & Atom Breakfast hosted by Citizens for Nuclear Technology Awareness (CNTA). The breakfast was held at Newberry Hall in Aiken, S.C.
Dozens of students from the Savannah River Nuclear Solutions (SRNS) Internship Program were recently offered a chance at full-service positions during what SRNS called a signing day event held at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site, near Aiken, S.C.