Ep 06: John Wagner, Idaho National Labs

In part 1 of 5 in our special INL series we interview John Wagner, the Associate Laboratory Director of the Nuclear Science and Technology Directorate. If you're not familiar with the structure of the National lab hierarchy… that title is a big deal. In the first half of the episode we discuss:

• John's entrance into the field and early experience at Oak Ridge National Labs
• His expertise on developing new methods of understanding how radiation moves through matter
• He talks us through the basics of spent fuel management and a briefer on the status of Yucca Mountain.
• And in the second half we talk through the some of the facilities at INL
• John gives us an overview of the five different divisions that fall under the Nuclear Science Directorate including: "Domestic Programs", "Nuclear Fuels and Materials" "Fuel Cycle Technologies" "Nuclear Systems and Analysis" and "Regulatory Safety" divisions
• What role the INL plays in advising the NRC
• The three buckets of Advanced Reactor Design and INL's history in facilitating R&D
• He talks us through the concept of transients and how INL tests them
• We touch upon a topic that's very important to me, Energy Abundance
• And we close out with a glimpse into some of the future work INL and John's perspective into the promise of Nuclear Energy on the whole.