Steve Girrens

Steve Girrens, Associate Labs Director & Chief Engineer for Nuclear Weapons

Nuclear Deterrence Stockpile Management, Components and Production Associate Labs Director & Chief Engineer for Nuclear Weapons

Steve Girrens is Associate Labs Director for Nuclear Deterrence Stockpile Management, Components, and Production at Sandia National Laboratories, responsible for the safety, surety, and reliability of the nation’s nuclear weapons stockpile in coordination with the nation’s physics laboratories and utilizing capabilities from across Sandia. Steve is also the Chief Engineer for Nuclear Weapons (CENW), responsible for addressing all system stockpile issues that could affect assurance of stockpile safety, surety, and reliability. He leads the non-nuclear component development and serves as the primary component contact with Kansas City National Security Campus. Steve leads all Mark Quality internal production efforts within Sandia, including manufacturing of assigned components, and he is responsible for governance of Sandia’s product realization processes.

Before joining Sandia, he was Associate Director for Engineering Sciences at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) where he guided engineering capability advancement and programmatic delivery that emphasized applied engineering technology, accelerator operations and technology, and prototype fabrication in support of LANL’s national security missions. Steve spent nearly 40 years working at LANL in several facets of engineering, including preliminary design, computational analysis, prototype testing, and transition to manufacturing.

Steve has expertise in mechanical engineering design and analysis, fracture and thermo-mechanics analysis, computational mechanics, program management, and technology transfer. He also worked in the NNSA’s Office of Defense Programs on matters of policy, planning, and analysis. Steve is a Fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers and a registered Professional Engineer (PE) in New Mexico.

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