PHOENIX — The Department of Energy’s head of nuclear cleanup, the CEO of Longenecker & Associates and officials connected with Finland’s spent nuclear fuel program will help kick off the 52nd Waste Management Symposia (WMS) here Monday morning.
Tim Walsh, DOE’s assistant secretary for environmental management, will be part of the morning plenary session as will John Longenecker, the CEO of Longenecker & Associates, which recently became part of Geosyntec.
In addition to the two speakers from DOE’s weapons complex, the other Monday plenary session speakers will include Linda Kumpula, senior specialist with Finland’s Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment, which regulates the nation’s nuclear sector.
The other kickoff speaker will be Ilkka Poikolainen, the CEO of Posiva Oy, the Finnish company in charge of disposing of spent fuel into deep underground bedrock.
The annual gathering in downtown Phoenix has been known to attract upwards of 3,000 representatives of the nuclear industry, government agencies and others in the field from both North America and multiple nations worldwide.
The event, which runs through Thursday, has experienced ups and downs in recent years. The conference was temporarily forced to go online rather than in-person during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The 2025 event saw noticeably less people at a time when U.S. federal government layoffs where slashing the workforces at government agencies such as DOE and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
This year’s event will include briefing on DOE cleanup sites, small modular reactors and advanced nuclear designs, the potential for fusion energy, artificial intelligence, including DOE’s Genesis Mission.