The Auburn Alumni Engineering Council has selected four Auburn Engineering graduates and a veteran faculty member as recipients of the group’s 2012 recognition awards. Presented during the council’s homecoming honors banquet, this year’s Distinguished Auburn Engineer awards went to Buzz Miller, Ed Reynolds and Jeff Stone; the Outstanding Young Auburn Engineer award to Emily Zieman; and the Superior Service award to Joe Morgan.
Buzz Miller, an Atlanta-based 1983 graduate in chemical engineering, serves as executive vice president of nuclear development for Georgia Power and Southern Nuclear. Responsible for overseeing the development of Southern Company’s nuclear generation expansion efforts, he is also a graduate of MIT’s reactor technology course for utility executives. Miller joined Alabama Power in 1986 in the chemistry and environmental support section of Nuclear Generation and proceeded through a series of assignments at Alabama Power and Southern Nuclear before moving to Washington, D.C., as federal affairs manager. While there, he served at the Nuclear Energy Institute as acting vice president of legislative affairs. In 1999, he was elected Southern Company’s vice president of government relations, and was responsible for managing the company’s Washington office, including its activities with congressional delegations and executive branch agencies. He moved to his current position as a senior vice president in 2006. Miller is responsible for coordinating the construction and operation activities for the $14 billion Vogtle Units 3&4 project, which represents the first nuclear project on U.S. soil in more than 30 years. He is responsible for quality oversight, staffing and training, engineering, and federal and state regulatory compliance. At Auburn, he is a member of the Ginn Society’s Ramsay Circle, and was active in the development of the Alabama Power Nuclear Power Generations Systems program in the College of Engineering.
Ed Reynolds is a retired telecommunications executive who began his career as a co-op student with South Central Bell in 1967. He received his bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering in 1970, as well as an MBA from the University of Alabama in 1986. Reynolds continued at South Central Bell following graduation, and worked through a number of assignments in operations. His work in re-engineering the company’s PBX system brought him to the attention of AT&T, and he was transferred to corporate headquarters in 1982. Throughout the ’80s he worked with BellSouth Services, directing the development of engineering guidelines and policies for what would be one of the most extensive fiber optic networks of the time. He closed out the decade as vice president of BellSouth Government Systems before moving into the wireless arena in the ’90s. As regional vice president of BellSouth Mobility, he built the business from 30,000 customers in 1989 to 600,000 in 1995. Reynolds then transitioned to president of BellSouth Wireless where he was responsible for the management of the company’s worldwide communications strategy. He continued in top executive positions as the industry entered the new century, and is the only person to serve as president of all three of BellSouth’s wireless operating companies — BellSouth Mobility, BellSouth Mobility DCS and American Cellular Communications. Reynolds was recently appointed to serve a three-year term on the board of directors of the First Responder Network Authority, which is charged with creating a nationwide integrated voice and data network to seamlessly integrate police, fire and EMS services on the local, state and national level. He is a member of the State of Alabama Engineering Hall of Fame.
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