01-03-2011, 11:42 AM
PRESENTED BY:
Lindsey Garst
Jay Nargundkar
Jonah Richmond
Nuclear.ppt (Size: 3.73 MB / Downloads: 271)
Nuclear Power
Nuclear Power Today
• Provides almost 20% of world’s electricity (8% in U.S.)
• 69% of U.S. non-carbon electricity generation
• More than 100 plants in U.S.
– None built since the 1970s
• 200+ plants in the Europe
– Leader is France
• About 80% of its power from nuclear
Early History of Nuclear Power in the U.S.
Origins
• After World War II, development of civilian nuclear program
• Atlantic Energy Act of 1946
• 1954: first commercial nuclear power program
The Vision
• “It is not too much to expect that our children will enjoy in their homes [nuclear generated] electrical energy too cheap to meter.”
Manhattan Project
• Secret government project to create atomic weapons during World War II
• After the war, the government encouraged “the development of nuclear energy for peaceful civilian purposes.”
• This led to the technology used in nuclear plants today
Early Beginnings
• Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) established by Congress in 1946 as part of the Atomic Energy Act
• AEC authorized the construction of Experimental Breeder Reactor I ( EBR-1) at a site in Idaho in 1949
• in August of 1951, criticality (a controlled, self-sustained, chain reaction) was reached using uranium
• A football sized core was created and kept at low power for four months until December 20, 1951
• power was gradually increased until the first usable amount of electricity was generated, lighting four light bulbs and introducing nuclear generated power for the first time
• In 1953, the EBR-1 was creating one new atom of nuclear fuel for every atom burned, thus the reactor could sustain its own operation
• With this creation of new cores, enough energy was created to fuel additional reactors
• A few years later, the town of Arco, Idaho became the world's first community to get its entire power supply from a nuclear reactor
• This was achieved by temporarily attaching the town’s power grid to the reactor’s turbines
Atoms for Peace
• Began in 1953 and was designed by Eisenhower specifically to promote peaceful, commercial applications of atomic energy after the Manhattan Project and atomic bombings on Japan
• Public support for nuclear energy grew, federal nuclear energy programs shifted their focus to advancing reactor technologies
• With this came the support of utility companies, which saw nuclear energy as a cheap and environmentally safe alternative energy choice
Shippingport Atomic Power Station
• Department of Energy and the Duquesne Light Company broke ground in Shippingport, Pennsylvania in 1954 for the first commercial electric-generating station in the U.S. to use nuclear energy
• Opened on May 26, 1958, as part of Eisenhower’s “Atoms for Peace” program
• Three years later, it began supplying electricity for the Pittsburgh area
• It was by far the world’s largest commercial nuclear power plant, surpassing those already in place in the Soviet Union and Great Britain