Engineer to chair nuclear board

President George W. Bush has asked Engineering Physics Professor Michael L. Corradini to chair the U.S. Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board.

An independent agency of the U.S. government, the board provides independent scientific and technical oversight of the U.S. Department of Energy’s program for managing and disposing of high-level radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel from civilian nuclear power plants. Its activities also include characterizing Yucca Mountain in Nevada as a potential repository site. Corradini will serve a four-year term on the 11-member board.

“I am honored to be asked to serve on the NWTRB,” says Corradini. “The issue of spent fuel disposition and disposal of high-level nuclear waste has been and will become a bigger issue in the whole picture of nuclear power and its future in the United States. I hope the board will be able to be a positive influence in these areas and assist in protecting the health and safety of the general public.”

A member of the National Academy of Engineering, Corradini has been a consultant to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards and to the DOE’s national laboratories. He is chair of the Department of Engineering Physics at UW–Madison and director of the Wisconsin Institute of Nuclear Systems. Before joining the UW–Madison faculty, Corradini spent three years on the technical staff of Sandia National Laboratories, where he conducted research on severe accidents. He received his bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from Marquette University and his master’s and Ph.D. in nuclear engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is a Wisconsin Distinguished Professor and a fellow of the American Nuclear Society.