Nuclear Quality Specialists, LLC

Orville Cypret has over forty years professional radiation protection experience in the nuclear industry and leads the Engineering and Radiation Protection team. He has eighteen years experience in reactor core management and nuclear power plant nuclear engineering and health physics as senior technical lead. Orville has 17 years experience in the uranium enrichment stage of the nuclear fuel cycle as the facility's radiation protection manager and principal health physics consultant.

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Orville has provided technical support to the U.S. Department of Energy in writing and implementing 10 CFR835-compliant radiation protection programs and plans and performing facility reviews of radiation protection programs to confirm compliance with regulatory requirements.  He has experience evaluating ambient water quality calculations relevant to release of radionuclides to provide alternative to the release limits proposed by EPA; conducting radiological environmental assessments of real property, structures, and discrete items for detectable residual levels of radiological material; and developing and applying Authorized Limits for disposal of material with residual levels of radiological material.

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Orville has extensive experience providing technical health physics services to U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission regulated facilities. These services include technical evaluation of a new process to explain and predict the radiation physics responsible for an unexpected and variable photon field proximal to a device intended to remove a chemical contaminant.  He developed a computerized system utilizing artificial intelligence techniques to automatically evaluate TLD glow curves for anomalous presentation. He has managed both internal and external dosimetry programs, established the protocols for evaluating and responding to both internal and external contamination events; and assisted in development of facility offsite dose calculation manuals.  Additionally, Orville developed a laboratory technique to characterize hot particles using the PTB extrapolation chamber and conducted a project to characterize, in detail, the radiation field inside the dome of a once-through steam generator.

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Orville's experience as a nuclear engineer includes developing reactor core analysis protocols to evaluate reactor performance prior to initial criticality; performing thermal-hydraulic analysis of spent fuel pool cooling systems in support of fuel storage rack replacement with racks of a higher density.

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Orville has served as an adjunct professor developing and teaching radiation detection and instrumentation and teaching a senior-level course in fluid flow and thermal hydraulics. Orville has also acted as a galley reviewer for Nuclear Technology Journal for the American Nuclear Society and authored an invited paper describing uranium enrichment state of the art technology for Health Physics News.

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Orville holds a bachelor's degree in Metallurgy/Nuclear Engineering and a master's degree in Radiological Health. He is a licensed professional engineer and is certified by the American Board of Health Physicists as a Health Physicist (comprehensive). Additionally, Orville is certified as an ASME NQA-1 lead auditor.