Ben Howell

Gastonia, NC, USA

Mr. Ben Howell has over 15 years of nuclear engineering experience, including responsibilities for nuclear fuel fabrication facility inspections, surveillances of U.S. and international manufacturing facilities, analysis of fuel components and designs, resolution of engineering problems in fabrication facilities, and oversight of nuclear fuel NDE. He has served as lead engineer for fuel fabrication inspections, team member on NUPIC audits, and utility representative for fuel vendor proposed design/manufacturing changes. In addition to his work with commercial nuclear plants, he served as member on a Technical Review Board for a DOE project in response to the Fukushima accident

Mr. Howell has significant expertise in economic analysis for energy markets. He has performed energy market analysis for the Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO), Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) and PJM regional transmission organization markets; virtual trading for MISO, ERCOT, and PJM; evaluation of energy market pricing, weather patterns, transmission outages, and plant outages for submissions to the power markets; and analytical solutions to improve accuracy/efficiency in power market analysis.

His work history includes 13 years with Duke Energy, including as a Lead Nuclear Engineer where he was responsible for fabrication inspections at vendor fabrication facilities (3 to 5 per year). He also served as the nuclear fuel engineering representative for review of international manufacturing facilities; utility representative for analysis of fuel component design changes; and team member for Nuclear Procurement Issues Corporation NUPIC audits.

Mr. Howell has a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from North Carolina State University and is a licensed Professional Engineer in the state of North Carolina.

Areas of Expertise

• Compatibility and mixed core evaluations
• Core components design, materials, and performance
• Fuel Design & Manufacture
• Fuel design change reviews
• Fuel fabrication procurement
• Fuel handling, core loading, and operational support
• Fuel manufacturing technical oversight
• Fuel materials and irradiation effects
• Fuel performance and reliability
• New fuel design reviews / LTA's / Accident Tolerant Fuel
• Operation & Performance
• Poolside inspections and failure cause determination
• RCS coolant activity analysis (failed fuel assessments)
• RFP and bid evaluations
• Spent fuel examinations