Nuclear Energy 1 PDF

Nuclear Energy
“Nuclear power is a hell of a way to boil water.”

- Albert Einstein
• Following World War 2, additional nuclear weapons
testing was moved to part of the Marshall Islands,
called the Bikini Atoll (11°N,.
– This testing was codenamed “Operation Crossroads.”
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• Two nuclear devices were detonated at sea as part
of Operation Crossroads.
– The purpose was to study the effects of a nuclear blast
on an armada of naval ships.
• The first blast, called Shot Able, was dropped from
a plane (July 1, 1946). The second, Shot Baker, was
detonated underwater,
beneath the ships
(July 25, 1946).
• Different species of lab
animals were placed
on several ships, to test
for radiation poisoning
following the blast.
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Operation Crossroads Fallout
• Glenn Seaborg,
chairman of the
Atomic Energy
Commission, called
Baker “the world’s
first nuclear disaster.”
• The target ships of Shot
Baker were all heavily
contaminated with
radioactive fallout.
– Many were so “hot” that they could not be safely
decontaminated and had to be sunk.
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Atoms for Peace -December 8, 1953
• As the Bikini nuclear testing continued, President
Dwight Eisenhower gave a famous speech to the
United Nations:
“My country wants to be
constructive, not destructive.”
“…the United States pledges before you…

its determination to help solve the
fearful atomic dilemma--to devote its
entire heart and mind to find the way by
which the miraculous inventiveness of man
shall not be dedicated to his death, but
consecrated to his life."
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• Equipment and technology were provided to schools,
hospitals, and research institutions to help develop
nuclear technology towards more peaceful goals.
– The primary goal: electricity generation.
• Optimism for the new technology was very high.
• Lewis Strauss, chairman of the Atomic Energy
Commission, predicted that,
“Our children will enjoy in

their homes electrical energy
too cheap to meter.”
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Nuclear Reactors
• The process of
converting
nuclear energy
into electricity is
similar to that of
using fossil fuels.
– Water is boiled,
the steam is
passed through a
turbine, which
spins a generator.
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• As with nuclear bombs, the primary fuel is uranium-
235.
– Uranium ore is enriched and formed into fuel pellets.
– The fuel pellets are stacked into long, cylindrical fuel rods.
– Control rods, made of a neutron-absorbing material, are
placed amongst the fuel rods. They can be removed and
inserted to adjust the rate of the chain reaction.
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control rods, rods,
reaction reaction
increases decreases
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• One big advantage to nuclear power is that,
under normal conditions, it does not release any
air pollution, only steam.
Cooling
Tower in
Byron, Illinois 9
• Through the late
1970s, many new
reactors were
constructed all
over the United
States.
• Since that initial
boom, few new
reactors have
come online.
10
Nuclear Accidents
• In 1979, a movie called “The
China Syndrome” was
released.
– Fictional story about a California
nuclear plant that experienced a
near-meltdown of its nuclear
core.
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• Ten days following the movie’s release, the
Three Mile Island partial meltdown occurred.
– A relief water valve stuck open, allowing water to
escape from the core.
– A meltdown, when the
fuel and control rods
physically begin to melt
due to the heat surge
within the reactor,
partially occurred.
– No major leak to the
environment occurred.
12
• In 1986, a full meltdown occurred at the
Chernobyl nuclear plant located in Ukraine
(formerly Soviet Union).
• A test was being conducted on the reactor to
see how the backup water pump generators
would respond to a full power outage.
– The control rods were fully removed.
– At some point, the fission chain reaction began
occurring uncontrollably.
– An explosion ripped apart the containment building,
spreading radioactive fallout throughout the area
and into the atmosphere.
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• The burning core was eventually extinguished.
• The nearby employees’ town, Pripyat, was
permanently evacuated.
• A 30km radius around the plant, called the
exclusion zone, has been designated as
uninhabitable.
14
Fukushima March 11, 2011
• The most recent meltdown occurred following a
massive earthquake and tidal wave off the coast of
Japan.
• The generators powering the water pumps of some
of the Fukushima Daiichi reactors were flooded.
– Without cooling water, the core overheated and
experienced a meltdown.
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• Contaminated water from the plant leaked into
the Pacific.
• Top predators, like bluefin tuna, caught in the
Pacific have positively tested for small amounts
of radioactive fallout.
– A single serving of tuna has less than half of the
exposure from an arm x-ray.
– Some recent studies indicate that the western coast
of North America showed very limited signs of
having any radioactivity that can be attributed to
Fukishima
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Radioactive Waste Management
• About 100,000 tons of low-level
waste (clothing) and about
15,000 tons of high-level waste
(spent-fuel) waste is stored in
the U.S. from reactor usage.
• Spent fuel rods are temporarily
placed in deep water pools
while they cool down and the
fission reaction slows.
– Waste is then moved to large
casks of metal and concrete near
the reactor.
17
• The U.S. Department of Energy
announced plans to build a high-
level waste repository near Yucca
Mountain, Nevada in 1987.
• The facility met three important
criteria for long-term waste
storage:
– Low moisture.
– Geologically stable.
– Far away from major population
centers.
• Plans to use Yucca have since
been halted, due to objections
from Nevada residents.
– No long-term storage plan has
been accepted by the U.S.
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• Some alternative methods of nuclear
waste disposal have been researched.
– Transmutation uses the waste as fuel in a
different type of reactor, which converts it
to a less-dangerous waste.
– Geologic disposal involves
depositing the waste
deep below the Earth’s
crust in stable rock
formations.
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The country's 99 nuclear reactors produced 805 billion
kWh in 2016, almost 20% of total electrical output. There
are two reactors under construction.
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Nuclear Energy

“Nuclear power is a hell of a way to boil water.”

“…the United States pledges before you…

“Our children will enjoy in

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