Jobs in the ice condenser

We staff approximately 180 people for each nuclear plant refueling outage at the D.C. Cook nuclear power plant. These are short term temporary jobs. The 2 units at DC Cook are on 18 month fuel cycles. We perform maintenance during the refueling outages. Our work typically lasts about 5 weeks. During this time the majority of our staff will have 1 to 2 weeks of inprocessing / training working 4 10 hour shifts, followed by about 3 to 4 weeks of a 6 days a week 10 hours a day schedule. The next two outages are scheduled for the Spring of 2024 for Unit 2 and the Spring of 2025 for Unit 1. No experience is required and all new hires work in a group with an experienced job lead and supervisor. Basic requirements are:

  • The ability to climb stairs, to get to our job site requires walking up 50' of stairs.
  • Ability to lift 40 pounds repeatedly. This is a moderately physically demanding job and requires moving equipment that weighs up to 40 pounds as well as walking up many flights of stairs.
  • High school diploma or GED.
  • Drug and Alcohol testing, including drugs that are decriminalized at the state level but still illegal at the federal level, such as marijuana.
  • background check
  • pass all provided training

Jobs in the ice condenser:


Vibrating crew: To empty the ice baskets we use modified air powered concrete vibrators on 1/2” air lines to shake the ice out of the baskets. Depending on the location of the ice baskets it can take anywhere from 2 hours to 36 hours to fully empty an ice basket. The vibrators work together to break up the ice and the ice falls out of 1” square holes in the sides of the baskets. The vibrating crews make up the majority of our work force.



The vibrating crew will also work on knocking out ice in the flow channels between the baskets. When we refill the baskets with ice, some ice will get stuck in between the baskets. We knock this ice out of the flow passages with a spud bar, a metal rod attached to a long rope. If we did not perform this cleaning process the baskets would freeze together and we would not be able to weigh them.

Lowers crew: All the ice that gets emptied from the baskets falls down to lower ice. Our lower ice team uses 4” vacuum lines to suck up this ice which goes to a melt pot to remove the ice from the condenser. The lowers crew also verifies that we have emptied the baskets to where they need to be. The vibrators can damage the bottom of the baskets if they hit the basket bottom, so when we empty baskets we empty all but the final 4' of the basket. The lowers crew visually verifies a basket when we get close to having it empty.

FME crew: Our FME crew handles foreign material exclusion. The ice condenser is in a high risk FME zone. It is extremely important that when we are finished working in the ice condenser we leave nothing behind. Any material left in the condenser could work its way out of the condenser in an accident and clog the sump pumps, which would prevent core cooling. Foreign material exclusion is directly related to nuclear safety. Our FME crew ensures that all tooling and equipment, as well as all personnel that go into the ice condenser is documented in our computer system.

Support Crew: Our support crew handles all of the other tasks involved in servicing the ice condenser. This group is typically our more experienced workers. They handle ice basket inspections and repairs, filling ice baskets, removing and re-installing the intermediate deck doors, weighing the ice baskets, and completing all of the required surveillances of the ice condenser.

Pay Scale:
  • Our pay scale is broken up into 3 groups; techs, leads, and supervisors.
  • Tech pay scale: $28/hr +
  • Lead pay scale: $33/hr+
  • Supervisor pay scale: $40/hr+

Our leads and supervisors all start as techs.

Per diem: For employees who are eligible (see eligibility criteria) we offer a $110 a day per diem, as well as travel in and travel out at the federal mileage rate of 56 cents a mile ($500 cap). This is all tax free money to offset the dual expenses incurred by travelling away from home for work.

Submit a resume           or email Us at dzicejobs@gmail.com to join our team!