March 17, 2014

LAWRENCE BERKELEY LAB OFFICIAL CANDIDATE FOR NEW WTP PROJECT DIRECTOR

By ExchangeMonitor

Should the Department of Energy choose to again look beyond the current Federal Project Director ranks to fill the soon-to-be-vacant FPD slot at the Hanford Waste Treatment Plant, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory Chief Operating Officer Jim Krupnick has emerged as a potential candidate, WC Monitor has learned. If Krupnick is chosen, he would replace Dale Knutson, whose two-year agreement to serve as WTP project director is set to expire at the end of May. Additionally, it would continue a pattern of bringing in federal and contractor officials from Office of Science and National Nuclear Security Administration national laboratories to oversee work on the Hanford project. DOE, which is also believed to be weighing other candidates, did not return calls for comment on Krupnick yesterday.

For his part, Knutson is set to return to the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, where he worked before coming to the Hanford vit plant. The DOE Office of River Protection at Hanford announced Knutson’s planned departure earlier this week, saying that the Department is "going through a deliberative process to identify the potential candidates" for a replacement.

At Lawrence Berkeley, Krupnick is responsible for overseeing the lab’s Environmental Safety and Health, Facilities Management, Financial Services, Human Resources, Information Technology, and Public Affairs Divisions and Departments, plus the Office of Workforce Diversity. He was appointed as associate laboratory director for operations in 2008 by then-lab Director Steven Chu. Previously, Krupnick was a Division Deputy at the Advanced Light Source, and project director for the construction of the Molecular Foundry, according to the Lawrence Berkeley website.

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