2010 Recipients of AECL Awards of Excellence
Each year, the Awards of Excellence recognize an outstanding group of AECL employees who have made exceptional contributions to our company and our industry. Nominated by their peers, they represent the best of AECL in a variety of disciplines and endeavours.
A panel made up of Executive Management Committee members has the difficult task of choosing the recipients from a group of nominees that make us all proud. The recipients of these awards embody AECL’s values of innovation and excellence in performance.
The G.L Brooks Award for exceptional practical engineering is awarded to:
David Cox – An engineer by training, Dave has worked on various aspects of nuclear fuel and fuel cycles, waste management improvement projects and large project execution at Chalk River Laboratories for over 25 years. Most recently, Dave was the Project Leader for the NRU Vessel Leak Repair where he also played a major role in explaining the repair process to the media and the public in many of our videos. Dave has had the lead on several other large, politically sensitive projects for AECL, with equally impressive results. His engineering expertise and leadership abilities make him a truly worthy candidate for this award.
The D.F. Torgerson Discovery Award for outstanding achievement in research is awarded to:
Fred Adams for his development of a new approach for the validation of reactor physics codes for reactivity coefficients. His approach will form the new standard for reactor physics code validation in Canada with the ACR-1000 being the first beneficiary. Without Fred’s dedication, perseverance, technical capability and leadership AECL would not have achieved the successes it has in the reactor physics analysis of the ACR-1000 project.
Mike Brideau, Michel Gaudet, Zia Haque, Dave Rhodes for two inventions that resulted in significant improvements to AECL’s ECC strainers. The improvements provide new definitions for our current state-of-the-art product resulting in significant commercial revenue by improving performance and reducing costs with potential for ongoing commercial success as existing stations have to retrofit to meet new requirements and as new stations are built.
Glen Kyle, Nithy Nitheanandan, Bob O’Connor for their success in closing a CNSC declared generic action item addressing a very low probability safety item. Their breakthrough tests ruled out the possibility of a steam explosion in the calandria vessel in the event of a fuel channel melt. The experiments not only closed out an eight-year old action item, they confirmed the safety and integrity of CANDU reactors to the international nuclear community.
Siavash Khajehpour, Eduardo Lupia, Eric Nadeau, Andrew Weaver, Henry Zheng for the development of a probabilistic methodology to assess the probability of pressure tube failure caused by pressure tube/calandria tube contact and blisters. This new tool allows operators to rank individual fuel channels and make comparisons with other plant components such as feeders and steam generators. It has also led to improved operational safety and reduced the duration of outages by several days resulting in reduced radiation doses, and millions of dollars in savings for our customers.
Val Aleyaseen, Benoit Arsenault, Mustapha Boubcher, Catherine Cottrell, Holly Hamilton, Michael Ivanco, Yang Ruan, Tracy Zhou for the development and testing of a Natural Uranium Equivalent (NUE) fuel that combines appropriate amounts of Recycled Uranium (RU) and Depleted Uranium (DU) (both materials with limited practical use to-date) to simulate NU behaviour in the CANDU reactor without any adverse impact on existing operational and safety basis. This initiative has differentiated CANDU technology from its competition and opened the way for AECL to sell technology based on alternative fuels and alternative fuel-utilizing reactors in overseas markets.
Arjun Das, James Johnston, Guy Jonkmans, Blair Smith, Gordon Tapp, Shuwei Yue for their development of a unique radiation mapping technology that is used to image the distribution of high radiation fields and accurately locate highly radioactive components inside CANDU reactors, waste storage sites and other nuclear environments. The successful demonstration of the technique has led to continuing business for the Nuclear Instrumentation group, enhanced AECL’s reputation and will earn additional revenue.
The Distinguished Merit Award for exceptional contributions in any discipline is awarded to:
Dave Rhodes, Tim Sykes, Wai Wong, Changqing Zhang for successfully designing and qualifying a new CAN8T pump seal specifically for use in BWR reactor water recirculation pumps for Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO). The success of this project has made it possible for AECL to break into the Japanese market with the full support of TEPCO to further AECL’s business in Japan. The team has also created an excellent international reputation for AECL’s commercial services products and the opportunity for a new wave of AECL pump seal sales on the international market.
David Dixon, Jason Martino for planning, marketing and implementing the Underground Research Laboratory (URL) Shaft Enhanced Sealing Project (ESP) which earned revenues of over $2 million for AECL while the technology demonstration and test was underway. The closure of the URL has allowed the international waste management R&D community to gain valuable knowledge and demonstrated that AECL is at the forefront of waste management and sealing technology and a worthy partner.
Daniel Kuchar for his field services work on calandria inspections and debris removal. As the lead in six successful field campaigns at Bruce, Dan led his team to achieve beyond what is normally expected which accounts for the four perfect customer feedback scores for their work. Dan took the tools and procedures developed at Bruce and adapted them for similar work at Point Lepreau; resulting in significant time saved on the project. Faced with an aggressive schedule, Dan and his team modified and delivered the tooling and procedures and trained the Lepreau team to use them. Dan is planning a similar campaign for the Wolsong project.
David Tregunno is being recognized for his role in the successful completion of the Nuclear Cooperation Agreement between Canada and India. David was often called upon for advice and knowledge by government officials, ministerial staff and AECL executives during the negotiations. The close relationships he had developed over time with Indian government officials proved crucial to the process. Prior to the signing of the Agreement, AECL was unable to engage in detailed commercial discussion or exchange technical information with our Indian counterparts. As a result of the Agreement, the nuclear market has opened up and allows for cooperation in services and new-build initiatives with India in both domestic and international markets.
John Pietralik, Sherry Laroche, Lan Sun for their originality, teamwork and leadership in recognizing the Darlington preheater tube degradation as an issue that could affect existing CANDU reactors and the design of future CANDUs and for their work in understanding the mechanisms and causes. They developed recommendations for mitigation including an enhanced inspection as part of the utilities’ Steam Generating Aging Management plan, thus avoiding unexpected forced outages. As well, AECL will be modifying the design of steam generators to minimize or eliminate this potential degradation mechanism.
Peter Allsop, Robert Bodner, Madan Lal Dhawan, Hazen Fan, Brian Gihm, Ziping Li, Dan Popov, Jonathan Tyo for their technology assessment and product definition program for new build thorium CANDU plants in China. Working as two teams, they determined that a C6 reactor, with minor modifications, can use Th-LEU fuel and achieve a 20 per cent increase in fuel efficiency over a C6. The Chinese experts who reviewed the findings advised their government to build two TCR (Thorium CANDU reactor) units. The teams’ assessment allows AECL to use an existing product in a new market niche.
David Balla-Boudreau, Judy Burrell, Dale Coffin, Cathy Fisher, Shannon Jones, John Osborne, John Sagat, Ian Trotman for their commitment over the past three years in developing a comprehensive plan to protect the health and safety of employees and to mitigate any threat to our business in the event of a pandemic. Their immediate response to the H1N1 crisis last spring – informing and educating employees, monitoring AECL location access procedures, responding to employee issues, monitoring the regional and national situation for all sites, coordinating with government bodies and overcoming significant challenges to provide access to vaccine at a time when supply was restricted – was the key that kept the effects of the virus to a minimum at AECL. AECL’s Pandemic Plan has been reviewed by the CNSC and Public Works Canada (Emergency Response Co-Ordination) and received their full endorsement.
Kirk Cooper, Eli Fayzenberg, Reena Goyal, Mariana Popa, Ted Romaniszyn, Patricia Wadsworth, Daria Wrona for the development of three CADD innovations that have moved the possibility of designing the ACR product in the electronic world closer to reality. The Tekla-SP3D Synchronization via CIS/2, the Raceway Hanger Automation and the Pipe Stress Analysis Automation have also significantly decreased the time it takes to complete these tasks, and increased the accuracy of the result.
Vinicius Anghel, Jonathon McKay for the development of a novel methodology to assess the performance of safety flux detectors in CANDU 6 stations, a complex problem that had gone unresolved for many years. This development has enhanced AECL’s reputation for the analysis of safety-related CANDU instrumentation systems and based on its success and the innovative approach taken, it will be adopted by the industry and further commercial revenue will be earned for AECL.