Nuclear fuel cycle
•Uranium mining and milling
•Conversion and enrichment
•Fuel rod fabrication
•POWER REACTOR
•Reprocessing, or
•Radioactive waste disposal
–Low-level in commercial facilities
–High level at plants or underground repository
Front end: Uranium mining and milling
Uranium tailings and radon gas
Deaths of Navajo miners since 1950s
Uranium enrichment
•U-235
–Fissionable at 3%
–Weapons grade at 90%
•U-238
–More stable
•Plutonium-239
–Created from U-238; highly radioactive
Radioactivity of plutonium
Life span of least 240,000 years
Last Ice Age glaciation was 10,000 years ago
Neanderthal Man died out 30,000 years ago
Risks of enrichment and fuel fabrication
•Largest industrial users of water, electricity
–Paducah, KY, Oak Ridge, TN, Portsmouth, OH
•Cancers and leukemia among workers
–Fires and mass exposure.
–Karen Silkwood at Oklahoma fabrication plant.
•Risk of theft of bomb material.
Nuclear Reactor Process
•3% enriched Uranium pellets formed into rods, which are formed into bundles
•Bundles submerged in water coolant inside pressure vessel, with control rods.
•Bundles must be SUPERCRITICAL; will
overheat and melt if no control rods.
Reaction converts water to steam, which powers steam turbine
Technology depends on operators
Other reactor accidents
(besides TMI and Chernobyl)
•1952 Chalk River, Ontario
–Partial core meltdown
•1957 Windscale, England
–Graphite reactor fire contaminates 200 square miles.
•1975 Browns Ferry, Alabama
–Plant caught fire
•1976 Lubmin, East Germany
–Near meltdown of reactor core .
•1999 Tokaimura, Japan
–Nuclear fuel plant spewed high levels of radioactive gas
