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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.
Kenneth M. Young
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 53 | Number 2 | February 2008 | Pages 281-303
Technical Paper | Plasma Diagnostics for Magnetic Fusion Research | doi.org/10.13182/FST08-A1673
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
This paper introduces this special issue on plasma diagnostics for magnetic fusion research. Its primary purpose is to relate the measurements of plasma parameters to the physics challenges to be faced on operating and planned devices and also to identify the diagnostic techniques that are used to make these measurements. The specific physics involved in the application of the techniques will be addressed in subsequent chapters. This chapter is biased toward measurements for tokamaks because of their proximity to the burning plasma frontier, and to setting the scene for the development work associated with ITER. Hence, there is some emphasis on measurements for alpha-physics studies and the need for plasma measurements as input to actuators to control the plasma, both to optimize the device performance and to protect the surrounding material. The very different approach to the engineering of diagnostics for a burning plasma is considered, emphasizing the needs for new calibration ideas, reliability and hardness against, and compatibility with, radiation. New ideas take a long time to be converted into "workhorse" sophisticated diagnostics so that investment in new developments is essential for ITER, particularly for the measurement of alpha particles.