Paul Murray, most recently chief technology officer for Orano Federal Services, will lead spent nuclear fuel programs in the Department of Energy’s Office of Nuclear Energy effective next week.

Murray will join the agency at its headquarters in the Forrestal Building in Washington on Oct. 10 as the deputy assistant secretary for spent fuel and waste disposition, or NE-8. Kathryn Huff, assistant secretary for nuclear energy, made the announcement about Murray’s appointment in an internal email dated Sept. 28. The ExchangeMonitor reviewed a copy of the email.

Murray will lead DOE’s efforts to find a home for more than 90,000 metric tons of stranded spent nuclear fuel from civilian power plants. In the near-term, that means overseeing the agency’s consent-based siting process, which is focused for now on what constitutes consent and who may give it. Two states have outlawed the storage of spent fuel in their territories and no one had challenged those laws in federal court as of Monday.

Murray, who has worked in the nuclear industry for more than 40 years, relocated to the U.S. from Europe in 2007, Huff wrote in her email. He replaces Biran Smith, who had been the acting deputy assistant secretary for spent fuel “for the last few weeks,” Huff told the nuclear energy office. Smith is returning to his full-time role as a senior advisor in the nuclear energy office.

Kimberly Petry had held down the role of acting deputy assistant secretary for spent fuel for most of the time since December, when the agency’s last full-time NE-8, Samuel Brinton, left DOE in disgrace after being caught stealing luggage from airports.