NTI’s Bieniawski Honored for Outstanding Engineering Achievement

The College of Engineering at Penn State University will
honor Andrew
Bieniawski, vice president of material security and minimization at the
Nuclear Threat Initiative, and 12 other graduates for their outstanding professional
achievements at its annual awards ceremony, to be held April 20th at the
Nittany Lion Inn on Penn State’s University Park campus.

Established in 1966, the Outstanding
Engineering Alumni Award is the highest honor bestowed by the College of
Engineering and recognizes graduates who have reached exceptional levels of
professional achievement.

Andrew Bieniawski joined the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI)
as vice president for material security and minimization after 25 years of
serving in senior-level positions with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and
the National Nuclear Security Administration. AT DOE, he led the U.S.
government’s Global Threat Reduction Initiative (GTRI). Under his leadership,
GTRI significantly accelerated efforts and removed more than 2,300 kilograms of
dangerous highly enriched uranium and plutonium from vulnerable locations
around the world—enough material for terrorists to make more than 80 nuclear
weapons. During this time, Bieniawski provided direct oversight to ensure the
safe and successful completion of 21 highly complex operations to remove
vulnerable nuclear material in more than 15 countries, including Vietnam,
Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Russia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ukraine,
Mexico and Hungary.

Bieniawski leads key NTI projects related to nuclear
materials security and minimization, including the Global
Dialogue on Nuclear Security Priorities, the
IAEA/NTI Nuclear Fuel Bank and the International
Partnership for Nuclear Disarmament Verification. He is also an expert in
radiological threat reduction.

Learn
more about Penn State’s Engineering Achievement awards, and read about Bieniawski’s
work at NTI.