Project Dilithium – Boldly going back to a place our ancestors visited and prematurely abandoned

Project Dilithium – Boldly going back to a place our ancestors visited and prematurely abandoned

In January 2019, the Strategic Capabilities Office (SCO) of the U.S. Department of Defense officially informed the world that it was interested in learning more about small, mobile, nuclear generators. The SCO said it wanted to find out if there was technology available that could supply a forward operating base with abundant, emission-free electricity for…

ML-1 Mobile Power System: Reactor in a Box

This is an August 2022 update of an article first published in November 1996 and updated in February 2019. The first update was stimulated by discussions associated with DOD’s issuance of an RFI for mobile, modest power output atomic power systems. That RFI resulted in Project Pele, which has now selected BWXT to build a…

Treasure trove of documents about the ML-1, the US Army’s trailer-mounted, nitrogen-cooled, atomic fission-heated generator

I recently published an article featuring a video from the Army Nuclear Power Program that focused on the Army’s mobile, low power closed cycle nitrogen cooled nuclear reactor designated the ML-1. The article generated a good discussion that indicated a strong desire for more information about the program. My initial searches didn’t turn up a…

McMurdo Station – the New York of the Deep Freeze South

(Note: If you are impatient and do not want to watch cute photos of penguins, skip to 19:06 to learn more about the reasons why the PM-3A, a 1,500 kilowatt nuclear electricity generator and process heat supply system, was such a valuable contributor to sustained Antarctic research.) Nearly all of the images that are used…

McMurdo veterans’ cancers FAR more likely to be caused by cigarettes that by Nukey-poo

Note: (This story corrected on March 8, 2011) The world’s ignorance regarding the health effects of radiation is occasionally incredible. I just came across a story from New Zealand titled Health fears around polar nuke leak that attempted to implicate the Naval Facilities Engineering Command’s PM-3A, a small nuclear plant that supplied heat and electricity…

Small Reactors, Safety Culture, Safe Design, and Lessons Learned From SL-1

The United States has been operating small nuclear power plants continuously since the early 1950s. These reactors have been used for research and development, power generation, and ship propulsion. There have been tens of thousands of people associated with the design, development, manufacture and operation of these smaller reactors. The enterprise has accumulated an admirable…

The Atomic Show #133 – Todd Tucker, Author Atomic America

Atomic America has a thought provoking subtitle – “How a Deadly Explosion and a Feared Admiral Changed the Course of Nuclear History”. The unifying story through the book is one that most nuclear trained people know a little about – the accident at the Army’s SL-1 that took place on January 3, 1961. In Atomic…

The History of Light Water Reactor Market Dominance – Part 1

Every once in a while, I like to curl up with a good story that has villains, well meaning good guys, international intrigue, and perhaps even a moral. Sometimes those stories have happy endings, other times they leave you hanging and waiting for the next installment. I just finished such a book – Light Water:…