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September 8–11, 2025
Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
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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.
Samuel J. Zenobia, Lauren M. Garrison, Gerald L. Kulcinski
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 60 | Number 1 | July 2011 | Pages 344-348
Materials Development & Plasma-Material Interactions | Proceedings of the Nineteenth Topical Meeting on the Technology of Fusion Energy (TOFE) (Part 1) | doi.org/10.13182/FST11-A12377
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Surface morphology changes of sub-micron tipped tungsten needles (W.N.) and an engineered fine-grain tungsten (FGW) were studied after implantation with He ions at reactor relevant conditions. Surface and subsurface pore formation was observed on all of the samples by using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and focused ion beam (FIB) milling. Additionally, helium retention analysis was performed on the FGW and compared to several previously studied W materials.Three samples of FGW were irradiated with 30 keV 3He ions to 3×1017 He+/cm2 at 700 °C, 9×1017 He+/cm2 at 850 °C, and 1×1019 He+/cm2 at 1050 °C. SEM analysis revealed that the threshold for visible pore formation was below ~1018 He+/cm2. The sample irradiated to the highest fluence showed “coral-like” morphology on the surface, and FIB analysis showed that the sub-surface semi-porous layer extended almost one micron below the surface. The percentage of implanted helium retained in the samples ranged from 4.5-40%.Two W.N. were implanted with 100 keV 4He ions to conditions of 3×1018 He+/cm2 at 700 °C and 1.3x1019 He+/cm2 at 1000 °C. Extensive pore formation was observed on both specimens. FIB analysis revealed that a sub-surface semi-porous layer developed after ion implantation that extended ~300 nm in the W.N. implanted to the lower dose, and over 1500 nm in the needle implanted to the higher dose. This second needle also exhibited a drastic morphology change, which appears to be a result of the unraveling of the grains at the tip.
