Bechtel senior vice president Peggy McCullough has been awarded the 2019 American Society of Mechanical Engineering (ASME) Henry Laurence Gantt Medal, the organization has announced. McCullough oversees a multi-billion-dollar per-year portfolio of projects that are helping solve some of the most complex challenges faced by government and commercial customers anywhere.
The projects include management and operation of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, two nuclear security plants in Texas and Tennessee, and Bechtel’s commercial nuclear power business worldwide. Those projects employ more than 15,000 scientists, engineers, technicians, and other professionals.
The Henry Laurence Gantt Medal was established in 1929 and recognizes contributions to society through achievements in management as well as demonstrating understanding and skill in the field of human relations and engineering.
“This recognition is really a testament to the service Peggy has delivered to Bechtel customers for decades,” said Barbara Rusinko, president of Bechtel’s Nuclear, Security & Environmental global business unit. “She exemplifies that dedication we all strive for: to make a customer’s mission our own, and to partner with them for lasting positive impact.”
McCullough was selected based on her leadership of thousands of engineers and scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Yucca Mountain Nuclear Waste Repository, the Hanford Waste Treatment Plant, and the stabilization and design of the New Safe Confinement structure now over the destroyed reactor at Chernobyl. McCullough will accept the award at the ASME Honors Gala during the 2019 ASME Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition in November.
McCullough has more than three decades of engineering, procurement, construction, startup and commissioning, and operations experience. She was elected a Bechtel senior vice president in 2014 and was named general manager of the Nuclear Security and Operations business line in December 2017. She is also president of Bechtel Power Company, Bechtel’s commercial nuclear power subsidiary.
She joined Bechtel in 1988 and has successfully taken on leadership roles on a number of complex megaprojects covering environmental remediation, demilitarization, nonproliferation, and global security.
McCullough holds a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from San Francisco State University.
Bechtel Senior Vice President Peggy McCullough, pictured at the construction site of the Hanford Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant in Washington state.
