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September 8–11, 2025
Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
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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.
Yasunori Nakai, Kazuyuki Noborio, Yuto Takeuchi, Ryuta Kasada, Yasushi Yamamoto, Satoshi Konishi
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 64 | Number 2 | August 2013 | Pages 379-383
Alternate Concepts/Applications | Proceedings of the Twentieth Topical Meeting on the Technology of Fusion Energy (TOFE-2012) (Part 1), Nashville, Tennessee, August 27-31, 2012 | doi.org/10.13182/FST13-A18106
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
An application of a cylindrical discharge tube type fusion neutron beam source for medical purpose was investigated. Practicality and possibility of the medical irradiation plan were evaluated from the standpoint of engineering and medicine.Cancer treatment by BNCT (Boron Neutron Capture Therapy) was selected as an effective application to take advantage of this neutron source. Neutron transport in a phantom was calculated with the MCNP5 (Monte Carlo Neutron Particle calculation code version5), and the distribution of dose on the affected part medicated with a boron agent suggested satisfactory focusing.Since this neutron source is small size, it is designed to irradiate the affected part from many directions by crossfire irradiation. Flexibility of attitude and operation modes permits irradiation in a supine position from arbitrary directions. Because of low neutron flux, irradiation therapy is planned for multi-fractionation in a manner similar to CHART (Continuous Hyperfractionated Accelerated Radio Therapy). Crossfire irradiation and CHART will allow us to achieve new cancer therapy with a relatively lower dose rate than conventional BNCT. It causes apoptosis selectively to a cancer cell, reducing side effects and a patient's recuperation burden. This result suggests the possibility of advanced cancer treatment which improves QOL (Quality of Life) of the patients.
