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.
Hongsuk Chung, Jongchul Park, Daeseo Koo, Hyun-Goo Kang, Min Ho Chang, Sei-Hun Yun, Seungyon Cho, Ki Jung Jung, Seungwoo Paek
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 68 | Number 2 | September 2015 | Pages 368-372
Technical Paper | Proceedings of TOFE-2014 | doi.org/10.13182/FST14-944
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A tritium plant for nuclear fusion power plants consists of an SDS (Storage and Delivery System), an ISS (Hydrogen Isotope Separation System), a TEP (Tokamak Exhaust Processing system), and an ANS (tritium plant Analytical System). Korea has been developing an SDS. The main purpose of this tritium storage and delivery system is to store and supply the D-T gas needed for DT plasma operation and to provide the necessary infrastructure for short- and long-term storage of large amounts of tritium. We have been developing tritium storage beds for the SDS.
The primary role of the metal hydride beds in the SDS is to store and supply D-T fuel during DT plasma operation. ZrCo and depleted uranium (DU) have been extensively studied. Compared to the use of ZrCo, which is disproportionate at temperatures of higher than 350°C, DU hydride can be heated up to very high temperatures sufficient to pump hydrogen isotopes without using gas compressors. Our experimental apparatus used to test the experimental DU bed consists of a tank that stores and measures the hydrogen, and a DU bed used for the hydriding/dehydriding of hydrogen. Our DU bed is a horizontal double-cylinder type with sintered metal filters. The bed is composed of primary and secondary vessels. The primary vessel contains a DU, and a vacuum layer is formed between the primary and secondary vessels. In this study, we present our recent experimental results on the direct delivery of hydrogen isotopes from a DU hydride bed. We also present the effect of the initial bed temperature and impurity gas on the hydriding rates.
