BWX Technologies has tapped Dave Broussard, a former contractor at the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory, to be general manager of the company’s nuclear-naval parts factory in Barberton, Ohio.
Broussard will take over the 750-person manufacturing site as it prepares to hire 80 more people and spent $80 million to ramp up production of heavy components for the nuclear reactors that will power the Navy’s Ford-class aircraft carriers, as well as Virginia– and Columbia-class attack and ballistic missile submarines.
The factory is part of BWX Techologies’ Nuclear Operations Group: the company’s largest operating segment.
Broussard has been with BWX Technologies since 2004. He was most recently the director of DOE’s Transient Reactor Test Facility at the Idaho National Laboratory, which restarted in 2018 after a 20-year hiatus. The facility was designed to test fuel for fast reactors but has since been used as an experimental platform to irradiate various materials. BWX Technologies has used the facility to test fuel for possible space-based nuclear reactors.
Battelle is the prime manager for the Idaho laboratory, with BWX Technologies as an integrated subcontractor.
Broussard has a bachelor’s of science in nuclear technologies from the University of the State of New York, BWX Technologies said. He also served on the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier the USS Carl Vinson.
