Company News Archives

News & Views, Volume 49 | Inspection Optimization: Probabilistic Fracture Mechanics

April 20, 2021/in Bob Grizzi, Company News, Fracture Mechanics, News, News and Views, Nuclear Asset Integrity, Nuclear Energy, Scott Chesworth/by Structural Integrity

By: Scott Chesworth (SI) and Bob Grizzi (EPRI)

The goal was to determine whether the frequency of current inspection requirements was justified or could be optimized (i.e., increase the interval of certain inspections to devote more attention to higher-value inspections and thereby maximize overall plant safety).

Executive Summary
Welds and similar components in nuclear power plants are subjected to periodic examination under ASME Code, Section XI. Typically, examinations are performed during every ten-year inspection interval using volumetric examination techniques, or a combination of volumetric and surface examination techniques. Nuclear plants worldwide have performed numerous such inspections over plant history with few service induced flaws identified.

Structural Integrity Associates Appoints Anthony (Tony) W. Robinson as Senior Vice President and Chief Nuclear Officer

January 25, 2021/in Company News, Nuclear News/by Structural Integrity

Structural Integrity Associate, Inc. (SI) is pleased to announce that Anthony (Tony) W. Robinson will be joining Structural Integrity as the Senior Vice President and Chief Nuclear Officer, effective January 4, 2021. Tony spent more than 25 years (collectively) at Framatome (formerly AREVA, Inc. and predecessor companies), and most recently was the Senior Vice President of Products and Engineering. He previously held roles of Senior Vice President Customer Accounts & Government Affairs, Vice President New Builds North America, and Vice President New Builds Business Development. Additionally, he was the Vice President US Nuclear Services for BWXT from 2013 – 2016.

“With nearly 30 years of progressive executive leadership in diverse areas of nuclear energy, Tony brings a wealth of industry knowledge and experience, and we are very excited to have him join the SI Team, commented Mark Marano, SI CEO. “I have had the opportunity to work with Tony in the past and his collaborative leadership skills along with his ability to work closely with both customers and partners to ensure lasting and mutually beneficial relationships meet our preferred partnership objectives”.

Tony holds a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Akron, attended the Executive MBA program at Kent State University, and is a licensed Professional Engineer (PE) in the state of Ohio.

Structural Integrity Associates, Inc. is an employee owned specialty engineering and services company providing structural integrity assessment insights and services to achieve asset management excellence across multiple industries including Nuclear, Fossil, Oil & Gas, and critical infrastructure.

Structural Integrity Associates Food and Donations Collection for Angels & Sparrows

December 28, 2020/in Community Outreach, Company News/by Structural Integrity

This past Holiday Season, the Charlotte office of Structural Integrity collected donations for Angels and Sparrows Soup Kitchen, whose mission is to fight hunger in Huntersville and the surrounding area.

Structural Integrity Associates Achieves Milestone with Pegasus Code Development

December 4, 2020/in Company News, Nuclear Energy, Nuclear Fuel/by Structural Integrity

On October 28^th, the Structural Integrity (SI) Nuclear Fuel Technology Team achieved a major milestone in completing the first Verification & Validation phase in the development of its nuclear fuel performance and behavior code Pegasus^©. “This is a significant step by the SI Team” commented Vick Nazareth, SI Fuel Director. “We have been developing Pegasus^© since 2017 to incorporate cutting edge computational technology and four decades of fuel behavior modeling and analysis expertise into a software program”. The code addresses a need for deeper fuel integrity insights within the nuclear industry to achieve next level fuel performance and licensing. Dr. Joe Rashid, Scientist and Senior Technology Developer of the code added “this code will analyze fuel behavior through the entire fuel cycle from initial startup to used-fuel storage”.

SI announced the development of Pegasus^© in the SI newsletter in 2019, Introducing Pegasus: State-of-the-Art Nuclear Fuel Behavior with the objective of enhancing the fidelity of fuel behavior and performance in support of advanced fuel technologies. The Pegasus^© code will go through additional validation testing over the next several months to meet a production roll-out in early 2021 in support of fuel performance behavior analysis across a broad spectrum of light water reactor and advanced reactor fuel designs.

” I am proud of the SI Fuel Team”, said Mark Marano, SI CEO.” This milestone exemplifies our ability to provide innovative structural integrity solutions for clients across structures, systems, components, water chemistry and nuclear fuel.”

Structural Integrity is an employee-owned specialty engineering and services company providing innovative engineering solutions and services to achieve asset management excellence across multiple industries including Nuclear, Fossil, Oil & Gas, Renewables, and Critical Infrastructure.

Executive Director of Project Management Nuclear Business Development Leader

October 26, 2020/in Company News/by Structural Integrity

Mike comes to SI following tenures at Westinghouse Electric and Framatome. During his 25 year career in the nuclear industry, Mike has held a variety of leadership roles that spanned operations and business development. Selected accomplishments in the operations realm during that time included building and leading the Westinghouse Balance of Plant Engineering Department that included over 100 engineers, and leading the commercial deployment of a new alloy 600 mitigation technology in the US. From a commercial standpoint, Mike led the Business Development Departments for two different 75+ Million dollar businesses to achieve substantial top-line growth.

Mike will bring the broad range of experiences to SI to drive improvement in project management in order to achieve next-level performance and customer satisfaction. Mike will also hold a secondary role of Business Development in the SI Nuclear Business Unit, where he will use his experience and industry contacts to promote SI engineering technology to the global fleet.

Structural Integrity Associates Board Elects New Chairman

August 27, 2020/in Company News/by Structural Integrity

On August 27th, the Structural Integrity Associates Board elected Matt Sunseri as new SI Board Chairman replacing Barry Waitte who will remain on the board until his announced retirement in May. “I look forward to Matt’s leadership and insight in this new capacity,” said Mark Marano, Structural Integrity Associates CEO and Chief Nuclear Officer. “SI has a long heritage of providing high value engineering and consulting to the Nuclear Industry and this change enhances our strategic focus in this key zero-carbon industry segment.”

Matt joined the board in 2019 and is the former President and CEO of Wolf Creek Nuclear Operating Corp. While at Wolf Creek, he was responsible for all aspects of the safe, reliable, and cost-effective operation of the plant and supported the development of international leaders through the World Association of Nuclear Operators. Matt brings nearly 40 years of utility experience having worked in both the regulated and merchant energy markets. He also serves as a member and chairman of the nuclear safety review board for the Point Lepreau Nuclear Generating Station in New Brunswick, Canada.

“I am honored to serve as the SI Board Chair and look forward to working with the other Board members as we fulfill our duties to the Company and its shareholders. I have always found that when transitions occur, it is a good opportunity to review our capabilities and the value we bring to clients,” said Matt.

Structural Integrity Associates is an employee owned specialty engineering and services company providing structural integrity assessment insights and services to achieve asset management excellence across multiple industries including Nuclear, Fossil, Oil & Gas, and critical infrastructure.

Structural Integrity Associates Releases 4th Generation BIoGEORGE BioFilm Growth Detector System

Structural Integrity Associates Releases BG4, a 4th Generation of the BIoGEORGE™ Biofilm Growth Detector System, enables real-time data monitoring

June 25, 2020/in Company News, Industry News/by Structural Integrity

The Structural Integrity (SI) Chemistry and Materials Team have completed the development and release of BG4, the 4th generation of the BIoGEORGE™ Biofilm Growth Detector system. The 4th generation release includes analytical software (BGConnect) and enhanced communication utilizing Bluetooth enabled phone/tablet App (BGMobile). Our system provides real-time data, customizable graphs, and shareable reports, allowing the user to evaluate their chemical treatment program’s effectiveness on-demand.

“We are excited to provide an updated version of the BIoGEORGE™ Detector system, BG4, to our clients. The BIoGEORGE product has been shown to reduce O&M costs by optimizing chemical treatments. With this next generation of enhancements, clients will be able to take advantage of real-time data with less effort”, commented Mike Ford, SI Chemistry and Materials Director. “We see this as a necessary step in product innovation for our clients as they continue to focus on controlling costs.” SI has begun to receive orders for the BG4 units from a returning client based on their positive experiences with the 3rd generation of the BIoGEORGE™ system and SI support.

About BIoGEORGE™

For over 20 years, SI has supplied previous generations of the BIoGEORGE™ Biofilm Growth Detector system to numerous clients in the power generation, refinery, pipeline, and chemical industries with great success. The product uses electrochemical methods to detect biofilm activity in water-based buildup on the probe surface to support chemical conditioning and plant performance.

For more information on BG4 and the latest marketing flyer, visit si-biofilmgrowth.com.

Structural Integrity Associates Announces the Appointment of Steve Gressler as Vice President, Fossil

April 23, 2020/in Company News, Fossil Power/by Structural Integrity

Structural Integrity Associates, Inc. (SI), a leader in engineering and technology in the power and oil & gas industries, today announced the appointment of Steve Gressler as Vice President of its Fossil business. Gressler will report to Mark Marano, SI President and Chief Executive Officer.

Mr. Gressler is a metallurgical engineer with over 30 years of experience in metallurgy, failure analysis, and the damage assessment of fossil power generation equipment and distributed heating and cooling systems with an emphasis on piping, boilers, headers, and balance of plant equipment. He is a principal contributor to engineering life cycle programs and procedures, risk assessments, analysis tools, and technologies to assess service degradation in low alloy and creep-strength enhanced ferritic steels. His current work focuses on the development, integration, and deployment of nondestructive testing and damage tracking technology in addition to engineering consulting and materials assessments.

Since joining Structural Integrity Associates in 1997, Steve has been a principal contributor to the methodologies applied for life assessment of high temperature and critical piping components. This includes characterization of creep and fatigue damage in longitudinal seam welds, girth welds, and header ligaments. It also extends to the engineering of data management systems used for aiding decision-making processes.

Marano noted, “Steve brings metallurgical leadership and technology development experience to the SI leadership team and is an integral part of our new customer focused strategy. Steve’s knowledge of the fossil business, tenure with SI, and relationships with our clients will accelerate our journey to create value for power and oil industry customers as a highly valued engineering and technology partner.”

Gressler received a Bachelor of Science in Metallurgical Engineering from the University of Pittsburgh and is a Registered Professional Engineer. Steve is also a prior recipient of the SI Riccardella Innovation Award for Prioritization Method for Fossil Plant Piping.

Structural Integrity Appoints Sean Fuller as Executive Director of Sales and Marketing

March 19, 2020/in Company News/by Structural Integrity

Structural Integrity Associates, Inc. (SI), a leader in engineering and technology in the power and oil and gas industries, today announced the appointment of Sean Fuller as Executive Director of Sales and Marketing. Fuller will report to Mark Marano, SI President and Chief Executive Officer, who recently joined the company in February.

Fuller joins SI from Curtiss-Wright Corporation where he was an Innovation Champion and Innovation Lead – Product Engineering in the Nuclear Division. Previously, Fuller served as Executive VP Sales and Technology for GSE Systems Inc., a provider of simulation, training, and engineering solutions to the power and process industries. There he was instrumental in establishing technology partnerships to develop the nuclear plant control room of the future.

Fuller brings to SI more than 30 years of commercial and new product introduction experience in the power industry. He began his career at GE Nuclear, a division of GE Power, as an Edison Engineering Program engineer where he served in commercial, engineering, and manufacturing leadership roles and was instrumental in commercializing technology that has enabled nuclear power plants to achieve 90%+ capacity factors.

Marano noted, “Sean brings extensive commercial leadership and technology development experience to the SI team and is an integral part of our new customer focused strategy. Sean’s success leading innovation and technology deployment will enhance our journey to create value for power and oil industry customers as a highly valued engineering and technology partner.”

Fuller received a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical-Nuclear Engineering from Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, Massachusetts and is Lean/6Sigma Black Belt certified.

SI appoints Mark W. Marano as President and Chief Executive Officer

February 4, 2020/in Company News/by Structural Integrity

San Jose, CA, February 4, 2020 – Structural Integrity Associates, Inc. (SI) announced today the appointment of Mark W. Marano as President and Chief Executive Officer, effective February 10, 2020. Marano succeeds Laney Bisbee following his retirement in late 2019.

Marano joins SI following a brief retirement from Westinghouse Electric Company, where he previously was Chief Operating Officer where he oversaw core global products and services and played a key role in the company’s emergence from bankruptcy. Previously, Marano served as Westinghouse President, Americas and EMEA sales regions for four years, driving strategic revenue growth in a challenging nuclear market.

Marano’s career spans over 35 years in provider and supplier sides of the power generation industry. Prior to Westinghouse, he held executive leadership positions with AREVA NP (currently Framatome) and GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy. Marano also held several senior leadership roles at American Electric Power (AEP), a power utility company with electric transmission/distribution networks as well as nuclear, coal, natural gas and hydro generation assets. There he provided financial and commercial leadership, plus for five years was CEO of AEP’s subsidiary, Numanco, a provider of staff augmentation services.

Barry Waitte, Chairman of the Board of SI, noted, “Mark brings tremendous experience to SI. While his energy industry experience is an obvious fit, it’s how he achieved his success that made him the right choice – a combination of exceptional business acumen and the ability to drive employee engagement and buy-in. His business development experience will also provide a basis for creating a platform for growth, not only in our core markets but also as we deliver our capabilities into new markets in the future.”

Marano stated, “I look forward to working with the talented SI staff and our industry partners to help deliver for our clients, and to get better in everything that we do. This is a humbling and exciting challenge for me, as SI holds a special place in the market as a highly respected technical consulting firm.”

Marano has a Bachelor of Science in business administration from State University of New York at Oswego. He will be located in SI’s Charlotte, North Carolina office.