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Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
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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.
Aaron Aoyama, James Blanchard, John Sethian, Nasr Ghoniem, Shahram Sharafat
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 56 | Number 1 | July 2009 | Pages 435-440
IFE Drivers and Chambers | Eighteenth Topical Meeting on the Technology of Fusion Energy (Part 1) | doi.org/10.13182/FST09-A8940
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
In support of the High Average Power Laser (HAPL) project the Electra Laser, a KrF Gas Laser system is being developed at NRL. The laser uses high voltage (500 - 800 keV), high current (100 - 500 kA), short pulse (100 - 600 ns) electron beams to pump the 0.14 MPa (20 psi) pressurized KrF gas cell, which is separated from the vacuum region by a 25 m-thick stainless steel foil, the Hibachi Foil. The foil is made of SUS304, operates between 180 °C and 450 °C, and has typical dimensions of about 0.3 m × 1.0 m. The laser pulses at up to 5 Hz, and the foil is subjected to repetitive thermal and mechanical stresses. In typical experiments, the foil lasts 1000 - 20,000 shots before suffering a catastrophic failure. In an attempt to improve foil performance a variety of design modifications are being considered along with changes in foil material. Earlier Hibachi foil designs used flat foils resting on 0.3 m long square water-cooled supporting ribs (1 cm wide). There is a 3.4 cm gap between ribs. . Advanced Hibachi foil concepts are under development using a scalloped foil design. In this paper we report on the comparative thermo-mechanical analysis between flat and scalloped foil geometries. It is demonstrated that the scalloped design reduces stresses to within yield limits of the stainless steel material.
