On July 9, 2008, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger announced the appointment of Per F. Peterson, Ph.D., PE, to a three-year term on the DCISC through June 30, 2011. Prof. Peterson previously served as a member from September 2, 2004, through October 9, 2007. Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr. reappointed Professor Peterson to a term on the DCISC commencing July 1, 2011 through June 30, 2014. Professor Peterson was subsequently reappointed by Governor Brown to a three-year term on the DCISC commencing July 1, 2014 and expiring on June 30, 2017. On October 11, 2017, Governor Brown reappointed Professor Peterson to a three-year term commencing July 1, 2017 and expiring June 30, 2020. In February 2021 Governor Gavin Newsom reappointed Dr. Peterson to a sixth three-year term commencing July 1, 2020 through June 30, 2023. On December 7, 2023, Governor Newsom reappointed Dr. Peterson to a three-year term commencing July 1, 2023 and ending on June 30, 2026.
Per F. Peterson is the Floyd Professor of Nuclear Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. In February 2020 he was elected to the National Academy of Engineering. Dr. Peterson was recently awarded the 2022 American Nuclear Society's Walter H. Zinn Medal. The Zinn medal is one of the most prestigious awards in the nuclear-engineering field to recognize an individual for outstanding contributions to the advancement or implementation of nuclear technology.
Since July 2017 Dr. Peterson has also served as the Chief Nuclear Officer for Kairos Power, a start-up company developing advanced reactor technology. He previously chaired the Nuclear Engineering Department from 2000 to 2005 and from 2009 to 2012 and chaired the Energy and Resources Group at U.C. Berkeley from 1998 to 2000. He received his Bachelor of Science Degree in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Nevada, Reno, in 1982. After working at Bechtel on high-level radioactive waste processing from 1982 to 1985, he received a Master of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley in 1986 and a Ph.D. in 1988. He was a Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) Fellow at the Tokyo Institute of Technology from 1989 to 1990 and a National Science Foundation Presidential Young Investigator from 1990 to 1995. He is past chairman of the Thermal Hydraulics Division (1996-1997) and a Fellow (2002) of the American Nuclear Society, a recipient of the Fusion Power Associates Excellence in Fusion Engineering Award (1999) and has served as editor for three technical journals.
Prof. Peterson's research in the 1990s contributed to the development of the passive safety systems used in the General Electric Company's Economic Simplified Boiling Water Reactor (GE ESBWR) and Westinghouse AP-1000 reactor designs. Currently his research group focuses primarily on heat transfer, fluid mechanics, and regulation and licensing for high temperature reactors, principally designs that use liquid fluoride salts as coolants. He is author of over 110 archival journal articles and over 120 conference publications on these topics.
On January 29, 2010, U.S. Department of Energy Secretary Dr. Steven Chu appointed Prof. Peterson as a member of the Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future ("BRC"), established by President Obama to provide recommendations for solutions to manage the Nation's spent fuel and high-level waste. He co-chaired the BRC's Reactor and Fuel Cycle Technology Subcommittee with Senator Pete Domenici. He has served as a member or chair of numerous advisory committees for the national laboratories and National Research Council. He participated in the development of the Generation IV Roadmap in 2002 as a member of the Evaluation Methodology Group, and has co-chaired its Proliferation Resistance and Physical Protection Working Group since 2002.
Dr. Peterson serves as DCISC Chair for the 35th Annual Report period, July 1, 2024 - June 30, 2025.