2021-01-28 Nuclear Energy Information Service

Transcript:2021-01-28 Nuclear Energy Information Service:
2021-01-28 Nuclear Energy Information Service Arjun Makhijani, Ph.D. President, Institute for Energy and Environmental Research www.ieer.org arjun@ieer.org Nuclear Weapons and Nuclear Power: The Connections December 19, 2013 Annapolis, MD hijani Weapons and Power Nuclear physics, chemistry, and engineering Raw material: uranium Process & enrich for bombs or make plutonium in a reactor Microsecond timing for runaway chain reaction: required for an explosion Major technical issue: ensure chain reaction grows fast enough – physical, chemical, and electrical/electronic challenges Nuclear physics, chemistry, and engineering Raw material: uranium Process for fuel, enrich for fuel Sustained chain reaction, required for a reactor Major technical issue: Ensure chain reaction stays controlled and runaway reactions are prevented, for instance changing power levels (Chernobyl was a severe example of a failure to do this.) Nuclear Weapons Nuclear Power 3 J. Robert Oppenheimer, 1946 “We know very well what we would do if we signed such a [nuclear weapons] convention: we would not make atomic weapons, at least not to start with, but we would build enormous plants, and we would call them power plants - maybe they would produce power: we would design these plants in such a way that they could be converted with the maximum ease and the minimum time delay to the production of atomic weapons, saying, this is just in case somebody two-times us; we would stockpile uranium; we would keep as many of our developments secret as possible; we would locate our plants, not where they would do the most good for the production of power, but where they would do the most good for protection against enemy attack.” Source: J. Robert Oppenheimer, "International Control of Atomic Energy," in Morton Grodzins and Eugene Rabinowitch, eds., The Atomic Age: Scientists in National and World Affairs, (New York: Basic Books, 1963), p. 55. Nuclear Power: A Fig Leaf on the H-Bomb (“Mike”) “Atoms for Peace” December 1953, after Soviet H Bomb Article IV in 1968 Non-Proliferation Treaty, after 1964 Chinese Test What is a nuclear power reactor? A boiler with the fuel inside. A nuclear bomb is like a lightning bolt 6 Nuclear reactors – proliferation Uranium enrichment US Spent fuel: 80,000 metric tons, ~100,000 Nagasaki-size bombs if separated. Global separated surplus commercial plutonium: ~300 metric tons, more than military inventory of all nuclear weapon states: enough for 30,000 to 60,000 bombs Where? UK, France, Japan, Russia, United States, India Courtesy of Urenco Photo