Our team

Dr. Fred Buckman’s career spans five decades and a long list of executive positions and accomplishments. Dr. Buckman’s past positions include the following: President of Power Group of The Shaw Group Inc., and during his tenure he oversaw Shaw’s premier capabilities in the fossil and nuclear power industry; Managing Partner of Brookfield Asset Management Inc., where he was responsible for the utility sector; in 1999, he founded and was Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Trans-Elect Development Company Inc., which became the first independent transmission company in North America.

He continues to serve as Chairman; President and Chief Executive Officer of Powerlink Transmission Company. He was Chief Executive Officer and President of PacifiCorp from 1994 to 1998, where he transformed the company from a regional utility to a significant national and international energy company that was sold to MidAmerican Energy in 2005 for US $5.2 billion. He also served as President and Chief Executive Officer of Consumers Power Company (now known as Consumers Energy), the utility subsidiary of CMS Energy, from 1988 to 1994.

Dr. Buckman continues to hold several directorships of leading energy companies, including: General Fusion Inc.; Smart Wires, a transmission technology company; and Solomon corporation. He is also a member of the StanCorp Financial Group Board. Dr. Buckman is the Adjunct Professor of Nuclear Engineering at the University of Michigan. He completed Harvard Business School’s Advanced Management Program in 1982. He received a bachelor’s degree in engineering from the University of Michigan and a doctorate in nuclear engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Dr. David Hill is a physicist and M.B.A. with 30 years of career experience in nuclear research and in managing large nuclear laboratories in the U.S. Dr. Hill has held senior executive management positions in the foremost national nuclear laboratories in the U.S. from 1984 to 2012, specifically Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) and Idaho National Laboratory (INL). From 2005 to 2012, Dr. Hill was Deputy Laboratory Director for Science and Technology at Idaho National Laboratory.

Throughout his career, Dr. Hill has gained experience in all aspects of nuclear energy, domestically and internationally. He has managed major projects, including at the experimental fast reactor at INL, and led the restructuring of INL. He has been responsible for hundreds of staff, and hundreds of millions of dollars in annual budgetary research and development expenditures.

Dr. Hill received his BSc (first class) and his PhD in mathematical physics from the Imperial College, London University. He further received his Honors Masters of Business Administration from the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business. He is a Fellow of the American Nuclear Society and Member of the International Nuclear Academy.

Simon Irish is Chief Executive Officer of Terrestrial Energy Inc. He has 20 years of global investment banking and investment management experience in New York and London. He has a formal education in the quantitative sciences and quantitative finance and has established and managed multi-billion-dollar alternative investment businesses in North America. Mr. Irish is the former Head of Man Global Strategies (MGS) in North America, the strategic investment division of Man Group Plc, a leading global investment management business.

During his tenure at Man, Mr. Irish was responsible for building and managing the largest and most active strategic investment and managed account business in North America. Mr. Irish was a member of the Investment Committee and responsible for corporate acquisition opportunities in North America for Man Group Plc.

Mr. Irish began his banking career at CSFP in London and in 2001 moved to New York as Director of FRM, the London-based investment firm, to establish its U.S. business.

In 2010, he focused on opportunities in breakthrough energy technologies and in particular nuclear energy given its unparalleled energy density and the commercial potential of advanced reactor technologies.

Mr. Irish holds an MA in Natural Sciences from Cambridge University and an MSc in Finance from the London Business School.

William D. Johnson (Bill) has almost 40 years of experience in and around the utility business. He started his career as an attorney with Hunton & Williams, a firm focused broadly on the utility industry, where he represented utilities across the United States. After becoming a partner in the firm, he transitioned to working directly in the utility field. Since 1992, Mr. Johnson has served in nearly every executive capacity within utility companies, and has been the Chief Executive Officer of three large utilities (Progress Energy, Tennessee Valley Authority, and Pacific Gas & Electric). Mr. Johnson has broad experience in operations, public and governmental affairs, finance, mergers and acquisitions and other aspects of the utility business. He currently serves on a number of corporate boards including TC Energy and Nisource.

Mr. Johnson graduated summa cum laude from Duke University and with High Honors from the University of North Carolina School of Law, which recognized him as a Distinguished Alumni in 2011.

Dr. David LeBlanc is a globally-recognized authority on Molten Salt Reactor technologies and has dedicated his career to the improvement and realization of advanced nuclear power systems, in particular MSR technologies. His work has focused on the simplification of design and reduction of R&D requirements to realize this goal. He obtained his Ph.D. in Physics from the University of Ottawa in 1998 during which time he focused on High Temperature Superconductivity and their application to fusion energy.

He obtained long-term fellowship funding from Canadian Fusion Fuels Technology Project and later focused his interests on improving nuclear fission power.

For 11 years Dr. LeBlanc held a teaching position with the Carleton University physics department. Concurrently he worked independently in the field of Molten Salt Reactors. In 2008, he founded Ottawa Valley Research Associates Ltd. to advance this work and has filed patents relating to innovations in MSR technologies that have specific bearing on improving and broadening the commercial application of the technology.

Dr. LeBlanc has been published numerous times in academic journals in conference proceedings and is extensively cited. He is a frequent speaker at international nuclear industry conferences on Molten Salt Reactor design concepts. He has long recognized that public engagement and education are also necessary to advance MSR technologies. To meet this objective, Dr. LeBlanc has had numerous news media engagements, including interviews and media articles in Mechanical Engineering Magazine, Popular Mechanics, Popular Science, CBC Radio, the Toronto Star and Nuclear Engineering Insider.

Hugh MacDiarmid’s executive experience includes serving as President and CEO of Atomic Energy of Canada Limited from 2008 to 2011, President and CEO of Laidlaw Transit Inc. from 2003 to 2005, Executive Vice-President, Commercial of Canadian Pacific Railway from 1995 to 2001, and President and CEO of Lumonics Inc. from 1987 to 1990. Mr. MacDiarmid currently serves as a Director of Ridge Canada Cyber Solutions Inc.

Early in his career, Mr. MacDiarmid was an Associate and then Principal with McKinsey & Company, a leading international management consulting firm. He holds an M.B.A. from the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University, graduating as a Miller Scholar, and an HBA from the Ivey Business School at Western University.

William Smith has 35 years of experience in the energy business, including over 20 years in the nuclear industry at Ontario Hydro and Ontario Power Generation between 1981 and 2002. He worked as a Resident Project Engineer at Bruce and Darlington during the construction and commissioning phases, and subsequently advanced to a senior leadership role as the Vice President of Supply Chain where his responsibilities included all nuclear procurement, materials management and source surveillance activities.

In 2002, Mr. Smith joined Siemens Canada rising to become the Senior Vice President of Siemens’ energy business in Canada, which included power generation and transmission, oil and gas and smart technologies across the energy sector. He was responsible for all sales and marketing, manufacturing, service delivery and project management and successfully built the business into a billion-dollar enterprise.

During Mr. Smith’s tenure in both the private and public sector, he has developed deep experience and capability in major project execution, building team capability and managing external interfaces with clients, suppliers and regulators.

Mr. Smith holds a B. Eng (with Distinction) from Carleton University and an MBA from the Schulich School at York University. He is a P. Eng registered with the Professional Engineers of Ontario (PEO) and with the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of Alberta (APEGA).

Canon Bryan has held executive management positions and served as officer and director for private and public companies in Canada and the U.S. Mr. Bryan has considerable experience providing financial management services to clients in various industries. He has focused primarily on energy and natural resources industries.

Mr. Bryan was a co-founder of: NioCorp (NB: TSXV), a company developing the largest niobium deposit in North America; Uranium Energy Corp (UEC: NYSE) where he served as an officer until October 2007. UEC is a producer of ISR uranium in the U.S. Previously Mr. Bryan was senior financial analyst for Lasik Vision Corporation (LSK: CDNX), which was the world’s largest provider of laser refractive surgical services.

Louis Plowden-Wardlaw has advised clients including Credit Suisse, KBC Financial Products and North Asset Management on a wide range of transactions, from project finance in the energy business, general banking and international corporate law, derivatives transactions, fund structuring and the management of high profile litigation. Previously he served as Senior Legal Adviser and Head of Legal at the Royal Bank of Canada, London, (1995-2000).

He is a Director of General Counsel Limited, a software services company, and a founding Trustee of the Activation Trust, an educational trust operating in Kenya. He was for six years a Director of Argo Real Estate Opportunities Fund Limited, a public company running and building retail parks in Central and Eastern Europe. Mr. Plowden-Wardlaw began his career as a banking and asset finance solicitor with Watson, Farley and Williams.

Mr. Plowden-Wardlaw graduated with an LLB (Law, First class) from the University of Birmingham and holds an MSc (Finance) from London Business School and an MSc (Conservation and Biodiversity Law) from the University of Kent. He is a Liveryman of the City of London. He was called to the Bar of England and Wales in 1990.

Dr. Ray Johnson served for nine years as Senior Vice President of Corporate Engineering, Technology and Operations, and Chief Technology Officer of Lockheed Martin Corporation. Lockheed Martin is a Fortune 100 company with annual revenues exceeding US $45 billion and employing over 116,000 personnel worldwide. Dr. Johnson was responsible for over 72,000 personnel working on over 4,000 prorams that provide the nation’s most vital security systems. Prior to his role at Lockheed Martin, Dr. Johnson spent ten years in senior executive roles with Modern Technology Solutions Inc. and Science Applications International Corp. – both large defense contracting companies.

Dr. Johnson has been invited to speak at the World Economic Forum from 2009 to 2014, and he has provided expert testimony to the United States Congress. He is a much sought-after speaker on business, strategy and innovation.

Dr. Johnson served as an officer in United States Air Force for 12 years. He received his Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from the Air Force Institute of Technology.

Charles Pardee has more than three decades of leadership experience in the electric utility industry, including past operational responsibilities at a dozen U.S. nuclear stations. From 2013 to 2017 he was Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of the Tennessee Valley Authority, the largest public power provider in the United States and the sixth largest by generating capacity with approximately 35 gigawatts, of which nuclear generation is 40 percent.

At TVA, Mr. Pardee has led more than 8,000 Operations employees in five business units: Nuclear; Power Operations; Transmission & Power Supply; Generation Construction, Projects & Services; and Safety, River Management & Environment. Leadership responsibilities include oversight of 17,000 miles of transmission lines and 35,000 megawatts of nuclear, coal, hydroelectric, natural gas and renewable energy generation.

Prior to joining TVA, he was chief operating officer of Exelon Generation, where he led more than 10,000 employees and managed 30,000 megawatts of diverse generation, including the nation’s largest nuclear fleet. At the same time, he served as chairman of Constellation Energy Nuclear Group, an Exelon subsidiary. He served as president and chief nuclear officer of Exelon Nuclear, and held other positions held within Exelon Nuclear.

Mr. Pardee is currently a member of the Nuclear Safety Advisory Board of Tokyo Electric Power Company, and a member of the Committee for Nuclear Power of the Emirates Nuclear Energy Corporation. He has held leadership positions at General Electric, three electric utilities, and numerous nuclear industry organizations and led the nuclear industry’s Fukushima Response Steering Committee.

Robin Rickman provides executive leadership in the development, administration, and implementation of a wide array of corporate business operations and activities ensuring compliance with legal requirements, industry regulations, organizational policies and professional codes and standards. Mr. Rickman has 40-plus years of experience in the nuclear energy business, including working with the U.S. Department of Defense, Department of Energy, and companies in the civil nuclear power industry.

Mr. Rickman is an engineering business management professional with broad experience as both a senior manager and a business development team leader in the energy and technology sectors. He has worked successfully in both federal and private energy sector enterprises, specializing in the intersection of private energy investments and public-sector policy at state, federal and international levels of governance and regulation.

Before joining Terrestrial Energy in 2015, Mr. Rickman was the Director of New Reactor Projects at Westinghouse, a role that also included management of the company’s small modular reactor program.

Mr. Rickman holds a bachelor of science degree in Business Management from the University of Phoenix.

Francis (Frank) Akstulewicz serves as the Licensing Manager and oversees the regulatory interactions with the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission for Terrestrial Energy USA. Prior to joining Terrestrial Energy, he had an exemplary 42-year career with the NRC, serving in numerous executive leadership and staff positions within the agency.

Mr. Akstulewicz served in several progressively responsible staff technical positions, including Technical Assistant to the Director of Nuclear Reactor Regulation (NRR), Section Chief for Projects in the License Renewal Branch in NRR, Branch Chief of the Nuclear Performance and Code Review Branch in NRR, and served as Technical Assistant for Reactors for Commissioner Jeffery Merrifield and Technical Assistant for Materials and Interim Chief of Staff for Commissioner Annie Caputo.

He supported the NRC’s mission to protect public health, safety, and the environment by managing licensing programs applicable to new nuclear reactors. In his position as the Deputy Director for Licensing Operations for NRO/DNRL, he provided executive leadership in completing application reviews pertaining to design certifications (DCs), early site permits (ESPs), and combined licenses (COLs) that led to the issuance of the first combined construction and operating licenses for Vogtle Units 3 & 4 commercial nuclear power plants.

Under Mr. Akstulewicz leadership, the NRC issued five DC or DC amendments, two ESPs, and 14 COLs. He also led the NRC’s efforts to develop a generic environmental impact statement for license renewal, served as the agency Chief Environmental Review and Permitting Officer, and revised the agency’s National Environmental Policy Act implementation related to its License Renewal Program.

Mr. Akstulewicz holds a bachelor of science degree with honors in Nuclear Engineering from The Pennsylvania State University.