Brian is a graduate of Bristol University, England, where he earned a Bachelor of Science degree (with honors) in Physics in 1997. Upon graduation, he elected to focus his education in the field of Nuclear Engineering, studying for the distinguished Nuclear Physics post graduate degree at the University of Birmingham, England. There he earned a Master of Science in the Physics and Technology of Nuclear Reactors in 1998. His thesis research was well received by the UK's Magnox Reactor group; establishing mathematical models projecting future trends in contamination levels, thus identifying cost effective decommissioning strategies for a series of UK Nuclear Power Stations.

Within a week of earning an MSc, Brian began his professional career as a core design engineer in the Reactor Physics Department at NNC, England. His duties primarily involved optimizing core design and reload patterns for a series of future reactor concepts, including Fast Reactor. This work also entailed fuel cycle scenario studies and analysis of multiple recycling scenarios, featuring combinations of both existing and new reactor systems (e.g. LWR and Fast Reactor). Given the research and internationally collaborative nature of this work, Brian prepared and presented numerous reports for UK and overseas clients at project review meetings and international seminar.

During his two years at NNC, Brian was also actively involved in thermal reactor core physics studies. These activities primarily included the selection of core parameters and optimization of enrichment zones, as well as the investigation of the impact on performance and safety of irradiation induced distortion of reactor components.

During the summer of 2000, Brian increased his exposure in Nuclear Engineering, accepting an offer of employment with BNFL, one of the world's largest Nuclear Services providers. Brian was initially responsible for neutron and gamma radiation shielding assessment for a wide variety of legacy and active commercial and government nuclear facilities at Sellafield, England. During this time Brian developed expertise in the application of Fuel Inventory Depletion and Shielding codes, including Monte Carlo and Point Kernel methods.

Brian quickly moved into the area of criticality safety assessment at BNFL, where his prior research oriented reactor physics background proved invaluable, particularly in understanding the behavior of irradiated plutonium-based fuels. His analytical and technical abilities were quickly recognized and realized on more challenging projects, such as those utilizing burn-up credit and those where innovative solutions were required to circumvent operability problems. Significant monetary savings have been achieved in respect of these efforts. Examples include the optimization of throughput of high enriched LWR fuels through thermal oxide dissolvers, the deterministic justification for removing the requirement to use soluble gadolinium poisoning in uranium metal dissolvers, and the deterministic justification for adopting a new (greatly less restrictive) calibration philosophy for uranium-235 assay machines.

Brian promptly broadened his experience in criticality safety assessment, working on the diverse portfolio of nuclear facilities at the UK's Sellafield site; from fresh fuel (MOX) production through the reprocessing and extraction and storage of uranium and plutonium from spent reactor fuel, as well as the treatment and safe processing of recycle by products. Brian quickly established a reputation for versatility; assisting with criticality safety assessment of fresh and irradiated UO2 and MOX reactor fuel transport packages. He provided support to the Sellafield MOX plant and provided significant input to the Sellafield MOX Research facility. He was also recognized as the lead burn-up credit criticality safety assessor for BNFL, under the mentorship of Jim Gulliford.

During his three and a half years with BNFL, Brian actively developed and disseminated (by way of technical workshops) innovative new analytical techniques for criticality safety assessment. These included applying the Los Alamos WORM Perl-based pre-processor to the UK's MONK (Monte Carlo criticality code) and WIMS (deterministic reactivity and fuel depletion) codes. These activities enormously simplified parametric studies, particular when utilized with the vast parallel processor cluster available at BNFL. As such, these developments reaped large benefits, not seen before, on many projects requiring optimal multi-dimensional solutions.

In October 2003, Brian further broadened his experience and exposure in criticality safety, taking up first point of contact responsibility for Waste Treatment and Decommissioning plants at Sellafield.

In addition to the abovementioned responsibilities, Brian participated in the production of company criticality safety technical guidance and held the position of the BNFL Company Nuclear Safety Technical Review Meeting Secretary for two years.

In March 2004, Brian joined Nuclear Safety Associates, Inc, providing criticality safety support to the US MOX Fuel Fabrication Facility, in Aiken, SC. Brian’s initial assignment involved managing the resolution of almost 600 criticality safety action items related to open items in 48 NCSEs. Brian originated the majority of resolutions in addition to assigning action items to other criticality safety staff for resolution. Timely resolution of action items was a high profile project deliverable identified by the client (the Department of Energy). All action items were expediently resolved with all fortnightly DOE targets met or exceeded.

Subsequent to successful closure of action items, Brian was assigned 10 of the 48 MFFF NCSEs and consequently actively represented criticality safety at a series of HAZOP meetings, where process hazards and safety strategies were re-evaluated in light of numerous design changes that had occurred following the original preliminary HAZOP studies. Brian incorporated the results of the final HAZOP studies into 10 MFFF NCSEs, carefully updating and amending the criticality safety bases and strategies for various MOX processes.

Between September 2004 and June 2006, Brian assumed the position of principal technical lead for the criticality safety work performed in support of the MFFF ISA Summary, which is the principal technical document that will be reviewed by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) in support of the first ever NRC licensing of a MOX Fuel Fabrication Facility in the United States. In this position, Brian originated the majority of technical detail contained in the ISA Summary, as well as coordinating the residual tasks performed by other criticality safety staff. All criticality safety technical matter (encompassing approximately 1000 pages of information) was carefully developed to ensure a coherent presentation , a proper level of technical detail, consistency with source documentation, and compliance with 10 CFR Part 70, Subpart H licensing requirements for operations involving fissile materials at new facilities.

In conjunction with providing full time support to the US MOX project, Brian has provided long term remote part-time support to two additional projects; based in Richland, WA, and Port Hope, Canada.

During the period between April 2004 and November 2004, Brian provided part-time criticality safety support to AREVA’s uranium facilities (including their blended low enriched-uranium (BLEU) facility) located in Richland, WA. Brian supported revision of a wide variety of nuclear criticality safety evaluations to ensure compliance with 10 CFR Part 70, Subpart H licensing requirements for new processes involving fissile materials at existing facilities.

Since April 2005, Brian has provided long term part-time criticality safety support to Zircatec Precision Industries, located in Port Hope, Canada, as part of design and licensing of the first ever enriched uranium fuel fabrication facility in Canada. In this capacity Brian has originated 50% of the nuclear criticality safety evaluations covering the majority of the facilities slightly enriched uranium (SEU) operations, in addition to originating numerous criticality safety calculations. All work was carefully developed to comply with the new Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC) regulations developed specifically for SEU operations.
Personal

Brian is a regular at the gym and enjoys a variety of outdoor sports. Brian enjoys spending quality time with his wife and their twin sons Jacob and Samuel. When not working, Brian and his family take every opportunity to sight-see and visit interesting cities in the United States and Continental Europe.