Interview with Dr. Regis Matzie – Senior Vice President and Chief Technology Officer, Westinghouse. On November 2, 2006, Rod Adams talked with Dr. Regis Matzie, Senior Vice President and Chief Technology Officer for Westinghouse. Dr. Matzie has been a key participant in the Pebble Bed Modular Reactor and several other advanced nuclear power system development…
I learned as an English major that writers are careful about selecting the words that they use. Whenever I speak about reusing the materials left over from the first pass through a nuclear reactor, I use the word “recycle”, but many people seem to like the word “reprocessing” instead. I am not sure why they…
As frequent readers know, I am a huge fan of the Pebble Bed Modular Reactor (PBMR) project that has been under development in South Africa since 1993. Though there have been some hurdles over the years, and the project has had to overcome a significant amount of resistance, the PBMR team – originally from Eskom,…
Before the discovery of nuclear fission, the only power source capable of supplying reliable electrical energy in remote locations was a combustion engine. Because of its compact nature compared to a coal fired steam engine, the internal combustion engine was the power system of choice. When engineers realized that a fission power plant could operate…
In 1970, President Nixon affirmed that the United States had long term objectives in the Antarctic regions and consolidated responsibility for management and funding of all Antarctic operations under the National Science Foundation. According to the new arrangement, the NSF was to take over the funding of PM-3A as of July 1, 1972. At the…
The final disposition of the soil was to spread it out on the ground and cover it with asphalt, turning the expensively gathered Anarctic soil into a parking lot that continues to serve the sailors at Port Hueneme, California. After the decision was made to decommission the PM-3A, the Naval Nuclear Power Unit began planning…
Recently I took my family to the Tampa, Florida Museum of Science and Industry (MOSI), which had a traveling exhibit on Antarctica. The display included a great deal of information about the dedicated explorers and unique wildlife indigenous to that remote land with one of the harshest climates on earth. Several of the exploration groups…
Between January 1 and March 1, 1962, the plant was assembled by a team of contractors and military technicians. On March 4, 1962, the plant reached initial criticality. The U. S. Navy began intensive involvement in Antarctic research missions during 1955 in preparation for the International Geophysical Year. The Department of Defense assigned the Navy…
It is almost as if NASA, ever cognizant of the need for taxpayer support of its programs, put this useful device “in the closet”, using it when necessary but maintaining an unofficial policy that technical details were best kept from public view. This issue was inspired by a request from one of our Internet readers…
The Apollo missions to the moon are famous for heroic astronauts, exciting first steps and incredible pictures that fired the imaginations of a whole generation of scientists, engineers and school children. Mixed in along with the hoopla about sending men into space on huge, fire spewing rockets, however, was some serious science. Each time the…
Tiny, milliwatt capacity RTGs found a home inside the chests of middle aged people in countries like France, Russia and even the United States. These devices – about the same size as a AA battery – were designed to power cardiac pacemakers. Not all of the RTGs that have been produced have been designed for…
Strontium is not associated with nuclear weapons and has never been called the most deadly element known to man. There is a precedence in the United States for widely licensing small quantities of sealed Sr-90; it is used in some aircraft ice detection systems. Essentially all RTGs that have been produced have been designed for…