News Archive

Ken Gavlik, Section President

Call for Abstracts for the 68th HPS Annual Meeting in National Harbor

Last year, the Board of the reconstituted Decommissioning Section sent a letter of introduction identifying several objectives, primarily focused on increasing the communication among section members. One major goal for 2022 was to host a Decommissioning Special Session at the Health Physics Society (HPS) annual meeting in Spokane. This was not possible. However, the Board was not discouraged and will push forward with the intent to host a Decommissioning Special Session at this year's 68th HPS Annual Meeting, which will be held in National Harbor, Maryland, 23–27 July 2023.

The HPS has issued a call for abstracts and Decommissioning Section members are encouraged to submit abstracts (and later presentations or posters) through the HPS Submission page describing their decommissioning topics and projects, focusing on unique solutions and lessons learned.

When submitting, please specify that you would like your presentation to be included in the Decommissioning Special Session. The deadline for abstract submission has been extended to 22 February 2023. Abstracts should not be submitted via email.

Other Matters

We strongly encourage section members to begin using the existing HPS Members Forum, which now includes a Decommissioning Section category. Remember to set your preferences to receive email notification of new posts. Once again, we do want to hear from members. What would you like the Decommissioning Section to do for you? Why do you think it fell into inactivity? Why do you think the Members Forum is so underutilized? What have you learned in your decommissioning career that you think would be useful to others?

One thing the Board would like to do is initiate a monthly spotlight on current decommissioning projects, regulatory issues, and/or recent Health Physics Journal papers relevant to decommissioning. We intend to do this through monthly webinars. Please reach out to us with your interest.

We look forward to hearing your feedback via email or the Members Forum.

Ken Gavlik, President
Phil Rutherford, Past President
Mike Grey, President-elect
Jim Reese, Board Member
Kevin Banks, Board Member
David DiCello, Board Member
Amanda Botzer, Secretary/Treasurer