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.
Ryoji Hiwatari, Yoshiyuki Asaoka, Kunihiko Okano, Seiji Mori, Hirokazu Yamada, Takuya Goto, Yuichi Ogawa
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 52 | Number 4 | November 2007 | Pages 911-915
Technical Paper | Inertial Fusion Technology: Drivers and Advanced Designs | doi.org/10.13182/FST07-A1609
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The fast ignition method enables a reduction of the laser power required to achieve a large energy gain. This suggests consideration of a new inertial confinement fusion power plant concept, which has a small fusion pulse and a high repetition laser with a dry wall chamber. To establish the potential of the fast ignition method and to make clear the critical issues, a Fast Ignition ICF reactor concept with a Dry Wall chamber and a High Repetition Laser (FI-DWHRL concept) was previously proposed. The maintenance approach for this Fast Ignition ICF reactor concept is preliminary considered and its critical issues are described in this paper. The large cask and the large maintenance port for replacing the blanket sectors are applied to this Fast Ignition ICF reactor concept. The first wall and blanket system is divided into 20 sectors and all beam lines go between blanket sectors. The vacuum vessel is located outside the blanket system and this vacuum vessel also serves as the tritium boundary. To replace the final optical device, 6 access corridors are placed along the reactor room. Finally, critical issues on this maintenance approach are listed.
