New manager named for Nevada Test Site

By Mary Manning

Friday, Nov. 7, 2008 | 1:34 p.m.

The 10th manager of the National Nuclear Security Administration Nevada Site Office, which manages all programs at the Nevada Test Site, has been named today.

Stephen A. Mellington succeeds Gerald L. Talbot Jr., said Darwin Morgan, a spokesman for the National Nuclear Security Administration.

Mellington has been the assistant manager for environmental management at the Test Site, the nation's former nuclear weapons outdoor experimental laboratory, 65 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

As manager, Mellington will be responsible for operating and maintaining activities at the 1,375-square-mile Test Site, an area larger than the state of Rhode Island.

He will be responsible for executing initiatives in keeping the nuclear weapons stockpile safe, keeping the Test Site ready to test nuclear weapons within 18 months if the president orders it, working on non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, managing the environment at the Test Site, researching alternative energy and other scientific and technical missions.

The Nevada Test Site became the nation's nuclear weapons proving ground in 1951 and above and below-ground nuclear experiments were conducted through September 1992. Since then, parts of nuclear weapons have been tested in subcritical experiments underground. A subcritical experiment involves small amounts of nuclear material that does not reach the level of a critical mass.

In addition he serves as the technical excellence officer, responsible for ensuring excellence among the federal staff.

He has served as director of the environmental restoration division and chief of the environmental restoration branch for the Energy Department at the Nevada office.

Mellington came to the Nevada National Nuclear Security Administration in 1987 as an environmental compliance specialist coordinating environmental compliance activities at the Nevada Test Site and serving as the National Environmental Policy Act officer.

Before joining the Energy Department, he worked for a decade with the Bureau of Land Management as district planning coordinator and served as project manager for numerous environmental impact statements in Nevada.

His federal career began in 1977 with the BLM in Winnemucca in northern Nevada.

Mellington currently serves as a director on the Nevada Wildlife Federation Board and is a current co-chairman of the Department of Interior Resource Advisory Council.

He is a graduate of the Federal Executive Institute and holds a bachelor of science degree in soil science from the University of Maryland. He is a Maryland native.

Mellington lives in Las Vegas with his wife, Suzanne, and has three adult children.