ARLINGTON, VA — Candice Robertson, the new senior adviser in charge of the Department of Energy’s $8-billion Office of Environmental Management, said here Tuesday she first became acquainted with nuclear cleanup issues by growing up around Nye County, Nev., the home of DOE’s Nevada National Security Site.
Robertson would subsequently win a “landslide” election by seven votes to the Nye County Commission, she told the Energy Facility Contractors Group (EFCOG) meeting here. Nye County was to be home of the canceled Yucca Mountain high-level radioactive waste repository.
As a Nye County commissioner, Robertson learned she did not need to be an expert on everything in order to make the right decisions. Instead, she only “needed to be able to ask the right questions of the right people,” Robertson said.
The newly-appointed Environmental Management executive pledged to work with communities, tribes, contractors and the workforce to advance nuclear cleanup.
Also while a county commissioner, Robertson said she was introduced to the work of the Washington, D.C.-based Energy Communities Alliance, which works with municipalities located alongside DOE sites. Robertson would eventually join DOE and the Office of Environmental Management, filling a variety of federal roles over the years.
“My experience has forced me to view EM [Environmental Management] through a variety of lenses,” Robertson said.
Robertson was appointed by DOE last month to lead Environmental Management with William (Ike) White, who led the office for five years, being nominated by the White House to become a member of the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board.
White’s five-year tenure provided stability to an organization which has had a high rate of turnover over the past few years, Robertson said.
