Book contents
- The Truth About Energy
- Reviews
- The Truth About Energy
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- A Word about Numbers
- Introduction
- Part I Out with the Old
- 1 Wood to Coal
- 2 Oil and Gas: Twentieth-Century Prosperity
- 3 The Nuclear World: Atoms for Peace
- Part II In with the New
- Part III Less Is More
- Afterword
- Book part
- Notes
- Select Bibliography
- Index
3 - The Nuclear World: Atoms for Peace
from Part I - Out with the Old
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 February 2024
- The Truth About Energy
- Reviews
- The Truth About Energy
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- A Word about Numbers
- Introduction
- Part I Out with the Old
- 1 Wood to Coal
- 2 Oil and Gas: Twentieth-Century Prosperity
- 3 The Nuclear World: Atoms for Peace
- Part II In with the New
- Part III Less Is More
- Afterword
- Book part
- Notes
- Select Bibliography
- Index
Summary
The history of nuclear power is examined through the work of a number of pioneering physicists, chemists, and engineers, including Marie Curie in Paris (radiation), Ernest Rutherford, James Chadwick, and John Cockcroft in Cambridge (model of the nucleus), and Enrico Fermi in Rome, New York, and Chicago (the first nuclear reactor CP-1). Albert Einstein and Leo Szilard’s cautionary letter to Franklin Roosevelt, the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos that oversaw the making of the first nuclear bomb, US Admiral Hyman Rickover’s nuclear fleet, and the transition to electricity-generating fission power by the US, UK, and Soviet Union is explored.
The ‘70s growth of “too cheap to meter” nuclear power is shown to be expensive, dangerous, and incapable of treating its own waste. Examples of the failure of the nuclear industry are given, in particular, accidents at Mayak, Cumbria, Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, and Fukushima, as well as numerous deep geologic repositories. The state-of-the-art of nuclear power, so-called small modular reactors, and the current slate of existing and under-development power plants are discussed. The history, design specifications, and potential for success of nuclear fusion is included with examples from JET, ITER, NIF, and others.
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- The Truth About EnergyOur Fossil-Fuel Addiction and the Transition to Renewables, pp. 193 - 296Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2024