Dania Castillo (Civil Engineering)

About DOE Fellow
Dania Castillo graduated from Florida International University (FIU) with a Bachelor’s degree in civil engineeringy. She is currently an active member of the student organization American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) at FIU. In the past, Dania has worked as a research assistant during the installation of the 12-Fan in the Wall of Wind Laboratory at FIU’s Engineering Center. Her focus of study is structural engineering and her interests include architectural engineering, energy and environmental designing, sustainable site developments and other green building operations. Dania is now employed with HDR as a transportation designer.

DOE Related Projects
Dania is currently working on Task 16: Computational Simulation and Evolution of HLW Pipeline Plugs under the mentorship of Dr. Dwayne McDaniel. Today, many DOE sites such as Hanford, Oak Ridge and Savannah River, are actively engaging in the transfer of radioactive liquid and sludge waste with the purpose to clean out and decommission stored nuclear waste. During transfer operations, millions of gallons of waste are retrieved from underground storage tanks and transported via underground pipelines for treatment or disposal. However, as numerously reported , blockage formation of nuclear waste slurries frequently disrupt the transfer lines which can escalate the remediation costs and pose to serious dangers to the environment. On a mission to finding solutions at FIU’s Applied Research Center (ARC) and in collaboration with the Department of Energy, Dania will be working on creating simulations of transport models to analyze and understand the mechanisms of pipeline plugging. With a collection of model testing and intensive laboratory research, Dania will aid to identify the correlations between the geometric design of pipeline systems and its affect on pipeline flow.