TVA Chief Nuclear Officer Bill Campbell said Donald Jernigan, who has been serving as site vice president of Dominion’s Surry Nuclear Power Station, will join TVA on Sept. 2 as senior vice president of nuclear operations.
Mr. Jernigan will report directly to Mr. Campbell. In his new role, he will provide day-to-day oversight of plant operations.
The position has been vacant since the promotion of Preston Swafford to executive vice president of TVA’s Fossil Power Group last summer.
In addition, Tom Coutu, currently vice president of Exelon’s Midwest Region Operations, will join TVA’s Nuclear Power Group on Sept. 29.
Mr. Coutu will fill the position of vice president of Nuclear Support, which currently oversees emergency services − including emergency preparedness, nuclear security, medical and the fitness for duty program − and nuclear functional area managers for maintenance, operations, radiological protection, chemistry and outage/work management.
The position was previously held by Randy Douet until his departure from TVA earlier this year.
“Filling these Nuclear Operations and Nuclear Support positions is another milestone in moving ahead to develop the nuclear organization that can sustain long-term performance at the top of the industry,” Mr. Campbell said.
“With the addition of Don and Tom, we have finished staffing one of the best all-around leadership teams in the industry. The addition of these two individuals will allow us to align the organization to a structure that will eliminate many of the temporary reporting relationships we have been working with, as well as providing more leadership and focus on day-to-day performance improvement across all of our sites.“
Mr. Jernigan has 25 years in the commercial nuclear-power industry, following his service in the U.S. Navy’s nuclear-power program.
Starting at River Bend in 1983, he helped put the plant into commercial operation.
He then moved to Florida Power & Light, where his assignments included general manager at Turkey Point Nuclear Station and site vice president at St. Lucie Nuclear Station.
In addition to his current role at Surry, he also served as the director of Operations & Maintenance at North Anna Nuclear Power Station. He led Surry to become one of the industry’s top performing sites.
Mr. Jernigan has a bachelor of science degree in physics from Florida State University and was certified as a senior reactor operator.
Mr. Coutu has more that 30 years of nuclear experience, starting at Duke’s Oconee Nuclear Station.
He worked his way through increasing responsibilities in engineering, maintenance and operations while at Oconee.
His next career move took him to the Nuclear Management Company’s Kewaunee Nuclear Power Station, where he quickly progressed to site vice president.
Mr. Coutu joined Exelon in 2005 as vice president of Midwest Operations.
He has a bachelor of science degree in marine engineering from the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy and a master of business administration degree from Clemson University.