Seventy one years ago — on December 2, 1942, at 3:25 pm — Enrico Fermi and his team achieved the first controlled, man-made, self sustaining chain reaction in a simple reactor. In recognition of that historical event, several of my nuclear colleagues refer to December 2 as “Critmass” (short for critical mass). The first nuclear…
This show was inspired by a post on Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Healthiness titled Why I’m Not Afraid of Fukushima. That post was written by a guest blogger named Jeremiah Scott; he is an electrical engineering student who is attending college in the Pacific Northwest with the help of the GI bill. He…
I was disappointed by the speeches given during the plenary session of the 2013 American Nuclear Society Winter Meeting. There is no value in trying to say that more gently. The advertised theme of the still on-going conference is a celebration of the 75th anniversary of the human discovery of fission. That is the almost…
(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…
It is time for a career change. For the foreseeable future, I am going to write books and articles for a living. This career move has been a long time in the making. During my first interview for a nuclear-related job, Admiral Rickover asked me, “English major? Why are you an English major?” I responded…
Almost exactly 50 years ago today, President John F. Kennedy, Jr. visited Hanford, Washington to give a speech about the importance of electrical power and the role that he expected nuclear technology would play in the future. (HT to the TriCity Herald for posting the video provided by the Department of Energy and to Martin…
Under current rules and assumptions, anyone who claims that they can design and build a power-producing nuclear reactor in less than 10-15 years is considered to be naive or hopelessly unrealistic. However, there is no reason to believe that everyone with the technical capacity for completing the task will follow the same rules. Even in…
Galen Winsor was a hands-on nuclear expert in the fullest sense of the phrase. Before irrational radiation protection rules were imposed, he and his colleagues directly handled used fuel. Since they needed to touch radioactive materials to accomplish their mission, they could not maximize distance or use shielding. Instead they limited their exposure time and…
Ted Rockwell has been an active participant in the development of nuclear energy production in the United States since the very earliest days of the technology. He started his nuclear career as an engineering troubleshooter in 1943 at the site that is now Oak Ridge National Laboratory during the Manhattan Project. He was one of…
One of the more frequent inquiries I have received during my years operating Atomic Insights is “What happened to the NS (nuclear ship) Savannah?”. I just learned about a recently completed documentary film by Thomas Michael Conner, a former member of the ship’s crew, that is designed to answer that question in detail using sea…
On Sunday, December 30, 2012, I gathered a group of atomic advocates to talk about their favorite nuclear energy stories from 2012. Participants in the discussion included: Gwyneth Cravens, author of Power to Save the World: The Truth About Nuclear Energy Will Davis from Atomic Power Review, ANS Nuclear Cafe and Fuel Cycle Week Meredith…
A friend shared the above video about the Fast Flux Test Facility (FFTF). I thought it was worth sharing and discussing, though I am not sure how current it is. The FFTF was not a shining example of government efficiency; it was initially conceived in the 1960s, finally completed in the late 1970s, started up…