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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.
M. Shimada, C. N. Taylor, R. J. Pawelko, L. C. Cadwallader, B. J. Merrill
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 71 | Number 3 | April 2017 | Pages 310-315
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/15361055.2017.1293422
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Recently, Tritium Plasma Experiment (TPE), a unique high-flux linear plasma device that can handle beryllium, tritium and neutron-irradiated plasma facing materials, has undergone major upgrades in its electrical and control systems. The upgrade has improved worker occupational safety, and enhanced TPE plasma performance to better simulate extreme plasma-material-interaction (PMI) conditions expected in ITER, Fusion Nuclear Science Facility (FNSF) and demonstration fusion power plant (DEMO). The PMI determines a boundary condition for diffusing tritium into bulk plasma-facing components (PFCs) and plays critical role in in-vessel and ex-vessel safety assessments. Enhancing surface capabilities for tritium-contaminated and radioactive samples is crucial for the PMI sciences in burning plasma long pulse operation. The TPE Upgrade and improvement of surface diagnostic capabilities for tritium-contaminated and radioactive samples at STAR facility help enhance tritium and nuclear PMI sciences for the development of reliable PFCs and tritium fuel cycle in ITER, FNSF and DEMO.
