Since joining the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) in 1976, and before that at the Battelle Columbus Division beginning in 1966, Dr. Simonen has worked in the areas of fracture mechanics and structural integrity. His research has addressed the safety and reliability of nuclear pressure vessels and piping as well as other industrial and aerospace structures and components.

During the 1990’s Dr. Simonen was a leader on the behalf of NRC and the ASME in the implementation of risk-informed methods for the inspection of nuclear piping. Dr. Simonen supported NRC staff by writing all chapters on piping reliability that are now part of DG-1063 Regulatory Guide on RI-ISI of Nuclear Power Plant Piping. These chapters provided the first formal set of guidelines to industry for probabilistic structural mechanics calculations for estimating piping failure probabilities. His recommendations impacted the selection of critical piping components that are given high priority for nondestructive examinations. On behalf of NRC and ASME Research, Dr. Simonen led a national effort during 1996-97 to benchmark PFM computer codes. The exercise concluded with PNNL performing the first ever statistically based calculations to quantify the uncertainties in calculated piping failure probabilities.

Since the early 1980’s he has led several studies for the USNRC on the effects of PTS on the failure probability of RPVs. This work has advanced the technology of PFM and methods for estimating the number and sizes of flaws in vessel welds. Dr. Simonen’s research has corrected longstanding deficiencies in traditional methods used to estimate the number and sizes of the welding flaws that govern the structural reliability of high-energy reactor piping and vessels.

Dr. Simonen was invited during 1995 and 1998 by the IAEA to meetings in Russia and Sweden to participate with a group of experts who evaluated the application of the LBB concept to RBMK reactors. The Central Research Institute of the Electric Power Industry invited Dr. Simonen to Japan during 1998 to present lectures on the reliability of reactor piping and methods to quantify the benefits of ISI programs.

Dr. Simonen has published over 200 papers, articles and reports in the open literature. He is a member/fellow with the ASME and serves on numerous ASME committees and codes and standards bodies, and has been awarded a number of prestigious awards from ASME.

Dr. Simonen holds a PhD. and Masters Degree in Engineering Mechanics from Stanford University and a B. S. in Mechanical Engineering from Michigan Technological University.

GERY WILKOWSKI
PRESIDENT

ENGINEERING MECHANICS CORPORATION OF COLUMBUS

COLUMBUS, OHIO

Dr. Wilkowski is an internationally recognized expert on the fracture behavior of piping in the nuclear as well as oil and gas industries. His areas of expertise include: full-scale pipe and pressure vessel fracture testing, nondestructive examination, JR-curve testing, high-rate toughness testing, experimental design and instrumentation, elastic-plastic estimation scheme analysis, impact testing, ASME Section XI flaw analyses, LBB analyses, and pipe system fracture behavior under seismic loading.

He was heavily involved in the development and verification of the fracture mechanics analyses for circumferential cracks in nuclear pipe for ASME Section XI. He was also a member of the following review committees:

(1) NRC Pipe Crack Task Group member that developed the NRC LBB procedure,

(2) NRC Peer Review Committee for proposed new seismic design rules for nuclear piping,

(4) NRC CRDM cracking review team member,

(5) NRC Davis-Besse clad integrity review team member,

(6) Consultant to AECB on CANDU pressure tube guillotine break phenomena, and

(7) Member of DOE’s Peer Review Groups for: Savannah River plant, New Production Reactor plant, Advanced Neutron Reactor, and uranium hexafluoride storage cylinders.

Dr. Wilkowski is a fellow of ASME. Currently he is a member of the following ASME Boiler and Pressure Vessel Code Section XI groups: Plant Operating Criteria Special Working Group, Flaw Evaluation Working Group, and Secretary of the Pipe Flaw Evaluation Working Group. He is the past chairman of the ASME Materials Fabrication Committee, and past chairman of the Pipe and Support Subcommittee of the ASME Operations, Applications, and Components Committee, all of which are part of the ASME Pressure Vessel and Piping Division. He was a coordinator for the 14th, 16th, and 17th Structural Mechanics in Reactor Technology (SMiRT) Conferences. He is a registered professional engineer in the State of Ohio since 1979.

Dr. Wilkowski has more than 200 technical publications, most on piping fracture. He is currently on the Editorial Board of the International Journal of Pressure Vessels and Piping. He is a past Associate Technical Editor of the ASME Journal of Pressure Vessel Technology, and guest editor of the Nuclear Engineering and Design journal. He was editor or co-editor of eleven ASME special technical publications. He was co-editor of four NRC Conference Proceeding Reports on LBB.

Dr. Wilkowski has both a B. S. and M. S. degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Michigan and a PhD in Nuclear Engineering from the University of Tokyo.