Are We Nearly There Yet?

Charlotte Williams is the Head of Communications for the National Nuclear Laboratory.

Charlotte grew-up and lives in Leigh with her husband and two boys. She enjoys running and walking to keep healthy, which counteracts her love of baking, something she developed an interest in during Covid using the months of lockdown to cheer family and friends up by baking.

In her early years, Charlotte attended Bedford High school where she was very work focussed and remembered for always having a smile on her face. She enjoyed the creative subjects, especially English and art.

After school, she initially went to Wigan & Leigh College however due to personal reasons couldn’t carry on this path and started to work at a local solicitors for 18 months. After this time, Charlotte realised the role wasn’t working and moved to a similar organisation to feel disinterested again which made her realise she had to cast her net further to see what other opportunities existed.  She was successful in getting a position on an undergraduate scheme at Marconi Communications which allowed her to move around the organisation whilst studying on day release where she achieved a BA Honours in Business Studies. One of her placements was in the HR team and realised she enjoyed the people side of thing, plus the marketing team focussing on business to business an experience valuable. 

From here, Charlotte went to work at Erikson in an internal communications role a position that allowed her to make a difference in employee’s working lives, by keeping them suitably informed during significant business changes.

Next on the cards was a move to British Gas Home Care in their internal communications team looking after communications for their contact centre and with the engineers going out on home visits – a very different role with lots of travelling – however very energetic with lots of creativity. She then moved within British Gas to their installations team to continue with her professional development, creating a different style of communications which involved getting safety messages out to engineers onsite with two large communications campaigns which were so successful ended up going company wide.

Charlotte currently works for the National Nuclear Laboratory, a move she made for family reasons with a young family.

For more information visit: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/charlotte-williams-9209852

Dr Tim Gregory is an analytical nuclear chemist working at the National Nuclear Laboratory, based on the Sellafield site. He has experience as a meteorite scientist and is active in outreach, talking in schools and on the BBC sharing his passion about space and science.

Tim lives in Cumbria and in his free time likes to go running, hiking, canoeing, and practises photography in the country.

Tim grew up in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire with his mum and sister. In his younger years he developed a passion for science and nature. In high school, a lot of his interests in science were stamped out as he felt unable to share his passion with anyone. Tim then went on to 6th form to do his A-levels where his passion for science returned meeting people who had a shared interest.

Tim then went on to study an integrated masters at Manchester in Geology with Planetory Science. During his studies, he completed a two and a half-month internship in Houston, Texas, at the NASA Johnson’s space centre studying meteorites. During his time in Manchester, Tim volunteered at the Manchester Museum where he discovered he had a knack on how to explain things in layman’s terms to the visitors about rocks.

Tim on to study for a PhD in Cosmochemistry at the University of Bristol. Whilst here, Tim went into schools to teach geology days and went to local organisation to present too and he soon realised he had a natural ability to present. He was also successful in securing one of twelve places on a BBC 2 programme called Astronauts where he made it to the final which included him being put in a centrifuge and spun at 4.5G for ten minutes! The TV programme gave him the opportunity to present twice on the ‘Sky at Night’. Tim’s also presented on BBC 4 and BBC Radio Bristol.

Tim took a sideways step into nuclear and is continued to be blown away by science.

Tim has also published a book called ‘Meteorite’.

For more information visit: https://www.tim-gregory.co.uk

Robin Taylor is a Senior Fellow at the UK’s National Nuclear Laboratory.

He lives in Cockermouth, with his wife Anna and three teenage children.

Robin grew up in Stoke where he enjoyed school and chemistry in particular as his teacher was very engaging and interactive.

Robin went to Manchester University to read Chemistry and continued on to do a PhD in radiochemistry on neutron activation analysis. Robin was successful in getting his research published.

After university, Robin joined BNFL in their Technical Department at Sellafield in the Advanced Reprocessing group. During his time at work, Robin helped set up university research alliances and set up the first one at Manchester in Radiochemistry. He then had an opportunity to manage a 50-strong team, stepping out of his comfort zone. Robin’s successfully worked his way up to be a senior fellow, working collaboratively on European programmes.

For more information please visit: www.nnl.co.uk

Georgia Pawson is a Consultant Analyst a Corporate Risk Associates and the acting chair of the Next Generation Nuclear Industry Council.

Georgia Pawson lives in Fulham near where she grew up. She went to boarding school at Wycombe Abbey. Georgia was diagnosed as dyslexic during primary school and found the pressure during her GCSEs overwhelming and decided to move to St Edwards in Oxford to do her A levels in Maths, Chemistry and Geography her where was offered more support with her dyslexia.

Georgia had a gap year where she lived in Australia and Spain and worked as a wind surfing and sailing instructor before going on to study Geology at Bristol University. At the end of her second year, Georgia was diagnosed with Chronic Fatigue where she was forced to take a year out of University. She then went back to University to join complete third year where there was an extra module added to the syllabus called Environmental Radioactivity which led Georgia to the career she is in.

After completing her Undergraduate degree in Geology, Georgia went to Birmingham University to do a Master’s degree in Nuclear Decommissioning and Waste Management. Georgia then went on to join Areva Risk Management Consulting as a Safety Consultant which she found a very friendly environment where she felt she could get involved and develop her skills. After two years, she then joined Corporate Risk Associates in London where she works on Nuclear safety cases and Periodic reviews of safety.

For more information visit: https://www.linkedin.com/in/georgiapawson/

This was recorded prior to Georgia moving to PA Consulting

Arun Khuttan is an Engineer at Magnox Ltd, a member of the Next Generation Nuclear Industry Council and also the COP26 lead for the UK Nuclear Institute Young Generation Network.

Arun grew up in Slough and went to Herschel Grammar School and now lives in Bristol with friends.

He enjoyed sciences at school as well as music where he played an Indian instrument called the dhol. He then studied A-Levels in Mathematics, Chemistry and Biology to potentially go down the medical route, encouraged by his dad. Medical places being limited, Arun took a gap year where he worked as a Healthcare Assistant before deciding to go to University College London (UCL) to study Chemical Engineering.

During his time at university Arun continued to work part-time as a healthcare assistant and then a sales assistant and laterally a M&S Operations Assistant.

As part of his degree, Arun went to Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, a private research university in Troy, New York on an exchange programme with UCL. While out there he volunteered on a design project building a solar powered hot water system for a village in Mexico before returning to UCL to complete a master’s degree in nuclear engineering.

During his master’s Arun worked on a research project for a Waste Effluent Plant in Australia for four months and spent two weeks at the University of California, Berkeley on a nuclear innovation bootcamp.

In 2016, Arun joined the NDA Nuclear Graduate Programme giving him an overview of the whole nuclear lifecycle before continuing his work with Magnox where he chairs their young person’s network to give young people a voice.

For more information visit: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/arunkhuttan

Maggie Brown works with EDF UK at their Hinkley Point C site. She leads on Supplier Relationship Management and previously led their innovation programme.

Maggie grew up in Ottawa Canada and now lives in Bristol with husband Sam and two-year old Mya.

In 2003, Maggie studied for a BA in Political Science at Concordia University in Montreal. Following this period of study, she travelled across Australia, Asia, Mexico and Central America.

Maggie then took the bold decision and moved to London to do her MSc in Political Sociology.  

After her MSc, and a short-term position with Ringway Jacobs in London, she began a job with Amida Recruitment in 2012, with a focus on sustainability. Impressed by her work ethic, Maggie won the Rising Star Award in 2012.

In 2013, Maggie decided to become an Independent Consultant and worked with clients like Mott MacDonald.

In 2016, she started as an Innovation Coordinator at Crossrail and was promoted to Innovation Programme Migration Manager before making a move to EDF as an Innovation Manager where Maggie got involved with their new build project at Hinkley Point C project. Maggie is currently Commercial Lead-Supplier Relationship Management.

When Maggie’s not too busy pushing the next generation of nuclear power stations into existence, in her spare time she likes to sail and also enjoys travelling, cooking and dancing.

For more information visit: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/maggie-brown-61870a42

Callum Thomas is the founder and CEO of Thomas Thor Associates providing recruitment, executive search and consulting services to the global nuclear industry and major infrastructure projects. Callum is also Chairman of KeySource Global.

He is also a co-founder with Monica Mwanje of Inclusion and Diversity in Nuclear which aims to support and enable the industry to achieve diversity and inclusion in their teams.

Callum spent the first six years of his life in Brighton and then moved to grow up in a village called Cosgrove in Milton Keynes. He attended Akeley Wood School and then went to Royal Latin School in Buckingham studying A-levels in Business studies, Mathematics and Physics.

He then went on to study Financial Studies at Bournemouth University in 1996. During his time at University, he ended up contracting severe meningitis which made the headlines in the local paper. He then went on to run a marathon for a meningitis charity (once recovered) and carried on running ever since.

He currently lives in Amsterdam with his wife Analia and are soon to be parents.  

In 1999, Callum became a Consultant - Recruiting for Contract Project/Programme Management, Business Analysis and Technical Consultant roles within the Financial Services and Public Sectors in the UK.

From here, he became the Business Manager for Sthree. Building and managing teams of up to 20 consultants and team leaders to provide recruitment services to the IT, Financial Services and Public sectors, Callum later went on to become the director of the business.

In 2009, Callum set up Thomas Thor Associates, having been inspired as a child, when he used to go his dad’s office at weekends, he had an ambition to have his own business from an early age. 

Callum is also a on the Board of Panda Life Sciences and a member of the Next Generation UK’s Nuclear industry Council.

In his spare time, Callum enjoys triathlon running, cycling, swimming and is looking for to travelling too.

For more information visit: https://nl.linkedin.com/in/callumthomas

Fiona Reilly is Managing Director of FiRe Energy and a Strategic Advisory Board member of the Nuclear Industry Association (NIA) and Non-Executive Director of Ansaldo Nuclear.

Fiona grew up in a village called Reed in the Ribble Valley and went to school in Burnley. She now lives in Weighbridge.

Fiona studied Law at university before completing a master’s level with International Business, Trade and Tax at The University of Manchester and qualified as lawyer in Lancashire. 

Throwing herself in at the deep end, she joined Alstom as their Company Solicitor and Commercial Counsel reporting directly to the Commercial Director and to the Board before moving to Norton Rose Fulbright LLP, Associate where she worked for 15 years.

During her career, Fiona has worked on some large nuclear cases, including advising on the proposed sale of UKAEA and advising International Nuclear Services on a number of politically sensitive issues relating to the storage and reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel and waste and MOX fuel. Fiona has also advised on the structuring, investment, financing and implementation of nuclear new build programmes not only in the UK but also in the Middle East and the Russian Federation.

In 2018, at the request of BEIS, Fiona Chaired the Expert Finance Working Group on Small Reactors (EFWG to create the EFWG and develop the programme for the group. She led a series of meetings (hearing presentations from a number of potential vendors) including discussions on available finance and the risks associated with small nuclear. In conclusion she drafted and presented the report to Ministers.

At the start of 2019, Fiona established FiRe Energy Limited to deliver advisory work to the energy and infrastructure industries providing strategic and project advisory services to a wide range of public and private sector stakeholders.

For more information visit: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/fiona-reilly-1992975

Tom Greatex is a Chief Executive of the Nuclear Industry Association (NIA).

Tom was born in Ashford in Kent and grew up in Tunbridge Wells, attending a local grammar school. During his time at school, he learnt to question and challenge actions and has continued to so throughout his career.

Tom now lives in in Oxfordshire near Culham and is married to Laura, with twin daughters Katie and Jessica.

Tom went to university at London School of Economics (LSE) where he studied politics.

Formerly MP for Rutherglen and Hamilton West, Tom was shadow energy minister from 2011 – 2015 and the opposition’s lead spokesman on nuclear energy, electricity market reform, smart grid and metering, carbon capture and storage, interconnection and both onshore and offshore oil and gas. Leading the scrutiny of the Energy Act and the Infrastructure Act in the last Parliament, he secured a number of amendments to the proposed legislation. He also served as a member of the Energy Select Committee from 2010 and from 2007-2010 was a policy adviser in the Scotland Office, including on energy.

Since 2015, he has been an independent policy analyst working in the energy sector for a range of clients, a frequent media commentator on energy issues, and a regular columnist for Utility Week. In a varied prior career, he was Director of Corporate Affairs for the NHS in Scotland, a chief officer in local government and a GMB trade union official in England.

In his spare time, Tom likes to watch his favourite team Fulham play football, spend valuable time with his family and enjoys watching films to relax from his busy life.

For more information visit: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/tomgreatrex

Nichola grew up in Warrington in Appleton and still lives in Warrington now with her husband Chris, son Harry and four dogs.

Nichola thought that she wasn’t particularly academic at school and preferred art and drama. She went on to study Health & Social Care at College with the idea of becoming a Social Worker whilst working part time at British Telecom (BT) as a Sales Advisor. She then went on to work at BT full time and really enjoyed the money she was earning.

Nichola then went on to become the Team Manager which enabled her to be able to fund buying her first house by the age of 18. This drove Nichola to want to progress further and applied for the role of Implementation Manager at Barclaycard where she was successful at getting the job. During her time at Barclaycard, Nichola was offered the opportunity to lead projects outsourcing companies in India which was a great experience for her.

After a number of years of developing in Project Management Nichola then started working for The Co-operative Banking Group as a IT Programme Support Consultant and worked her way up to Project Manager. Nichola then went on to work for United Utilities as Portfolio Manager for three years.

Nichola then joined National Nuclear Laboratory as Head of PMO and is now Head of Technology and Digital Change.

For more information, please visit: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nichola-newton-19a5644b/