• About
    • About Us
    • What We Cover
  • Advertise
    • Advertise
    • Our Advertisers
  • Contact
  • Donate
  • Send News
  • Subscribe

Oak Ridge Today

  • Home
  • Sign in
  • News
    • Business
    • Community
    • Education
    • Government
    • Health
    • Police and Fire
    • U.S. Department of Energy
    • Weather
  • Sports
    • High School
    • Middle School
    • Recreation
    • Rowing
    • Youth
  • Entertainment
    • Arts
    • Dancing
    • Movies
    • Music
    • Television
    • Theater
  • Premium Content
  • Obituaries
  • Classifieds

 

Trump nominates ORNL national security leader to DOE nuclear nonproliferation job

Posted at 1:53 pm February 9, 2018
By John Huotari Leave a Comment

Brent Park

Brent Park

 

President Donald J. Trump on Thursday nominated a national security leader at Oak Ridge National Laboratory to a nuclear nonproliferation job in the U.S. Department of Energy.

Brent K. Park is currently an associate laboratory director at ORNL, where he is responsible for national security programs.

Trump nominated him to be deputy administrator for defense nuclear nonproliferation in the Department of Energy.

The nomination announcement posted on the White House website said Park now leads and manages national security programs for the U.S. Department of Energy, the National Nuclear Security Administration (a semi-autonomous agency within DOE), and other sponsors. A nuclear physicist, Park was previously director of the DOE/NNSA Remote Sensing Laboratory, the White House said.

Advertisement

Previously, he managed and contributed to basic and applied research programs at Los Alamos National Laboratory, where his work included defense nuclear nonproliferation, modeling and analysis for nuclear weapons engineering, and manufacturing efforts in support of stockpile stewardship, physics of nuclear weapons, and fundamental physics research, the White House said.

Park has a bachelor’s degree, two master’s degrees, and a doctorate from Illinois State University, Indiana State University, Indiana University, and Ohio University, respectively, the White House said. He is on the faculty of the University of Tennessee’s Bredesen Center for Interdisciplinary Research and Graduate Education, and he is an adjunct professor of engineering at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

ORNL said Park is the associate laboratory director of the Global Security Directorate, or GSD, at ORNL. The mission of that directorate include supporting national priorities in global and homeland security for the U.S. Department of Energy and other agencies, providing research and development in areas that include nuclear nonproliferation and threat reduction, arms and export control, homeland security, energy, and counterterrorism technologies for DOE’s National Nuclear Security Administration and for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

“In addition, GSD provides basic and applied research for the U.S. Department of Defense on a wide variety of national challenges including materials science, sensor technologies, simulation and modeling, and power and energy applications for both mobile power and infrastructure requirements,” ORNL said.

Before he joined ORNL, Park served as the director of the U.S. DOE/NNSA Remote Sensing Laboratory, or RSL, an integral part of the Nevada Test Site contract managed by National Security Technologies LLC.

“In this capacity, he (Park) was accountable for RSL’s performance on the contract with DOE/NNSA, which predominantly focuses on supporting the national security mission through multidisciplinary R&D efforts,” ORNL said. “RSL addresses critical national security challenges with expertise and excellence in physical and environmental science; design and fabrication of electronic, mechanical, and structural systems; remote and robotic sensing; remote field experiments and operations. In this position, Dr. Park collaborated with national defense, homeland security, and intelligence community organizations in the applications of advanced technologies to meet their requirements.”

Advertisement

Park began his career at Los Alamos National Laboratory in 1989 when he performed his Ph.D. thesis experiment at the Los Alamos Meson Physics Facility (now the Los Alamos Neutron Science Center), using the Spallation Neutron Source. After joining the Los Alamos research staff, Park held progressively higher level management positions supporting DOE’s Basic Energy Science Program, Stockpile Stewardship Program, and nuclear nonproliferation missions, ORNL said. Park served as deputy division leader of the LANL Nuclear Nonproliferation Division and then joined the NTS.

Park has more than 25 years of experience in physics research and in research management. He is a co-spokesman on five nuclear physics experiments, has more than 50 refereed publications along with more than 80 contributed papers, and has given numerous invited talks. He has extensive experience in the design of experiments and apparatus for accelerator-based nuclear physics techniques, and in the detection of both charged particles and neutrons at low and medium energies. He is one of the pioneers in developing and introducing portable, real-time digital radiography detector systems for nuclear emergency response applications. Park has established strong working relationships with research universities to promote and advance a science-based approach driven by technological innovation, ORNL said.

Park is the second ORNL executive nominated by Trump. Jeff W. Smith, deputy director for operations at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, assumed his role as a member of the Tennessee Valley Authority board of directors after taking the oath of office in a ceremony in Knoxville on Thursday, January 11. Smith was nominated by Trump on September 21, 2017, and he was confirmed by the U.S. Senate on December 21. He was sworn in by U.S. District Judge Pamela L. Reeves of the Eastern District of Tennessee.

More information will be added as it becomes available.


Do you appreciate this story or our work in general? If so, please consider a monthly subscription to Oak Ridge Today. See our Subscribe page here. Thank you for reading Oak Ridge Today.

Copyright 2018 Oak Ridge Today. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Filed Under: Federal, Front Page News, Government, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, U.S. Department of Energy Tagged With: arms and export control, associate laboratory director, Brent K. Park, counterterrorism, Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation, deputy administrator for defense nuclear nonproliferation, DOE/NNSA Remote Sensing Laboratory, energy, Global Security Directorate, homeland security, Jeff W. Smith, Los Alamos National Laboratory, National Nuclear Security Administration, national security, Nevada Test Site, nuclear nonproliferation, nuclear physicist, nuclear physics, nuclear weapons, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, ORNL, President Donald J. Trump, Tennessee Valley Authority, U.S. Department of Defense, U.S. Department of Energy, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, White House

Advertisements

 


Join the club!

If you appreciate our work, please consider subscribing. Besides helping us, your subscription will give you access to our premium content.

Some of our stories are free, brought to you by Oak Ridge Today with help from our members—advertisers, subscribers, and sponsors.

But some are premium content, available only to members. Those are in-depth, investigative, or exclusive stories that are available only on Oak Ridge Today. They generally require significant time to report, write, and publish.

You can subscribe for as little as $5 per month.

You can read more about your options here.

We currently offer five primary subscription options to readers, and they include benefits.

Basic

  • Basic monthly subscription ($5 per month)—access premium content
  • Basic annual subscription ($60 per year)—access premium content

Pro

  • Pro monthly subscription ($10 per month)—access premium content, get breaking news emails first, and submit one press release or public service announcement per month
  • Pro annual subscription ($100 per year)—save $20 per year, access premium content, get breaking news emails first, and submit one press release or public service announcement per month

Temporary

  • Temporary access ($3 per week for two weeks)

We also have advanced subscription options. You can see them here.

We also accept donations. You can donate here.

If you prefer to send a check for a subscription or donation, you may do so by mailing one to:

Oak Ridge Today
P.O. Box 6064
Oak Ridge, TN 37831

Thank you for your consideration and for reading Oak Ridge Today. We appreciate your support.

Commenting Guidelines

We welcome comments, but we ask you to follow a few guidelines:

1) Please use your real name, including last name. Please also use a valid e-mail address.
2) Be civil. Don't insult others, attack their character, or get personal.
3) Stick to the issues.
4) No profanity.
5) Keep your comments to a reasonable length and to a reasonable number per article.

We reserve the right to remove any comments that violate these guidelines. Comments held for review, usually from those posting for the first time, may not post if they violate these guidelines. Thank you for your patience and understanding. Thank you also for reading Oak Ridge Today and for participating in the discussion.

More information is available here.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

More Government News

Residents discuss Dollar General in Marlow

A handful of Anderson County residents have expressed mixed opinions in government meetings about a reported proposal to build a Dollar General store next to Oliver Springs Highway in Marlow, but the Anderson County … [Read More...]

Read city manager’s retirement letter

This is a copy of the January 17 retirement letter from Oak Ridge City Manager Mark Watson to the seven Oak Ridge City Council members. Since August of 2010, I have been proud to serve the City of Oak Ridge as its … [Read More...]

Oak Ridge Public Library

Library restrooms will be renovated

The restrooms at the Oak Ridge Public Library will be renovated starting February 1. The renovations are expected to be completed by June 1. The renovations will result in increased accessibility under Americans … [Read More...]

Breakfast with Legislators resumes Monday

Breakfast with the Legislators begins this year on Monday. The monthly breakfasts are scheduled each year while the Tennessee General Assembly is in session. They are hosted by the League of Women Voters of Oak Ridge, … [Read More...]

Former AC Commissioner Hitchcock dies

Note: This story was updated at 11:30 a.m. Harry "Whitey" Hitchcock, who represented part of Oak Ridge in three terms on Anderson County Commission, died January 10. A former teacher, he was 76. Hitchcock served on … [Read More...]

More Government

More U.S. Department of Energy News

Y-12 celebrates new fire station, emergency operations center

A new fire station and emergency operations center at the Y-12 National Security Complex will replace "severely outdated" buildings that were constructed in the 1940s, about eight decades ago. The new buildings will … [Read More...]

Oak Ridge EM prepared for cold weather to prevent failures

From DOE Office of Environmental Management’s "EM Update" newsletter UCOR employees Andy Rodgers, left, and Alex Johnson install heat tracing to protect systems at the Environmental Management Waste Management … [Read More...]

Extreme Classroom Makeover applications due Jan. 31

The deadline to submit a video application is about one week away in a contest that awards $25,000 to improve STEM education in public schools in the region. ORAU's Extreme Classroom Makeover is open to third-grade to … [Read More...]

You may hear Y-12 sirens when maintenance performed

There will be maintenance work on the public warning siren system in Oak Ridge during the week of January 23, and people in the area might occasionally hear audio from individual sirens around the Y-12 National Security … [Read More...]

Officers can learn how to respond to radiological emergencies, thefts

A new center in west Oak Ridge will train law enforcement officers how to respond to radiological emergencies or potential thefts of radioactive materials. The Y-12 National Security Complex had a ribbon-cutting … [Read More...]

More DOE

Recent Posts

  • Y-12 celebrates new fire station, emergency operations center
  • One person seriously injured in Wednesday crash
  • Oak Ridge EM prepared for cold weather to prevent failures
  • Covenant Health donating land for Roane State health science center
  • School board approves aviation career path
  • Wildcats name new football coach
  • Free dental, vision, medical services in February
  • Junior Playhouse performs ‘Gingerbread: Hansel & Gretel’ in February
  • Extreme Classroom Makeover applications due Jan. 31
  • Obituaries: Jan. 20-Jan. 22, 2023

Search Oak Ridge Today

About Us

About Oak Ridge Today
What We Cover

How To

Advertise
Subscribe

Contact Us

Contact Oak Ridge Today

Copyright © 2023 Oak Ridge Today