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Fusion Science and Technology
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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.
F. Leuterer, M. Münich, F. Brandl, H. Brinkschulte, G. Grünwald, A. Manini, F. Monaco, F. Ryter, H. Schütz, J. Stober, D. Wagner, W. Kasparek, G. Gantenbein, L. Empacher, C. Lechte, H. Kumric, P. Schüller, A. Litvak, A. Chirkov, G. Denisov, A. Fix, V. Illin, S. Malygin, V. Miasnikov, V. Nichiporenko, L. Popov, E. Tai, V. Zapevalov
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 55 | Number 1 | January 2009 | Pages 31-44
Technical Paper | Electron Cyclotron Emission and Electron Cyclotron Resonance Heating | doi.org/10.13182/FST09-A4051
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
In 1989 the planning for a 140-GHz, 2-MW, 2-s electron cyclotron resonance heating system for ASDEX Upgrade started. These plans were finally approved in 1993. The system comprises four gyrotrons with four separate transmission lines and launchers. Although a 0.5-s test gyrotron was already installed in autumn 1994, it was only in summer 1997 when the first gyrotron of the final system was ready for use in the experiments, and in spring 2000 the system was completed with all four gyrotrons. This paper reviews the experience gained in construction and operation of this system. In particular, we describe how we solved problems with external magnetic fields affecting gyrotron operation. These fields originate both from the tokamak and from the cryomagnet of adjacent gyrotrons. We also report about the gyrotron performance, our techniques for the alignment of the transmission lines, the calibration of the polarizer mirrors, and the power calibration.
