Tech | August 21, 2011 | 14 comments

Laser technique to enrich uranium raises proliferation fears

source: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/08/21/laser-technique-to-enrich-uranium-raises-proliferation...

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KB723
By Agence France-Presse
Sunday, August 21st, 2011 -- 4:54 pm

WASHINGTON — US conglomerate General Electric is seeking permission to build a $1 billion plant for uranium enrichment by laser, a process which has raised proliferation fears, The New York Times said Sunday.

After testing the enrichment process for two years, GE has asked the US government to approve its plans for a massive facility in North Carolina that could produce reactor fuel by the ton, the report said, citing GE officials.

"We are currently optimizing the design," Christopher Monetta, president of Global Laser Enrichment, a subsidiary operated by GE and Japan's Hitachi, said in an interview with the newspaper.

The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission is expected to deliver its decision on whether to issue a commercial license for the complex by next year, the report said.

Uranium enrichment can be used to produce both the fuel for a nuclear reactor and the fissile material for an atomic warhead. New technologies are seen as potentially dangerous as they make it easier to build a bomb.

Monetta said the plant could enrich enough uranium each year to fuel up to 60 large reactors -- in theory, enough to power 42 million homes, or a third of all homes in the United States.

Donald Kerr, a former director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory who was recently briefed on GE's advance, said laser enrichment "appears to be close to a real industrial process" and a genuine technological breakthrough.

But critics say the technology could be co-opted by rogue states such as Iran or terror groups and used in the covert production of weapons, as it would be more difficult to detect small laser-equipped facilities.

"We're on the verge of a new route to the bomb," Frank von Hippel, a nuclear physicist who advised former US president Bill Clinton and now teaches at Princeton University, told the Times.

"We should have learned enough by now to do an assessment before we let this kind of thing out."

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/08/21/laser-technique-to-enrich-uranium-raises-p...

Image courtesy of Flickr Commons.

"A person would think that this kind of info would remain Hush Hush, especially when you bring Nuclear Proliferation into the mix"
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14 comments // Laser technique to enrich uranium raises proliferation fears

  • good_stuff
    • 0
      good_stuff  

    • I didn't think there was a problem with uranium enrichment... Iran can do it without importing any technology.

      I thought the problem with nuclear power has more to do with storage of spent fuel. Why are companies wasting their time and money on enrichment, which is sort of a non-issue? The government quit its nuclear mountain spent fuel storage site project, so who is going to use these tons of fuel?

    • 9 months ago
  • Gravity_Man
    • 0
      Gravity_Man  
    • good_stuff:

      It's a small part of the plan to give taxpayer~voter~citizens the illusion their tax dollars are being used for their good. Stuffing the pinata works too.

      As long as your eyes are stuck HERE reading today's tripe your eyes aren't off somewhere else actually learning what's coming down the pike (Armageddon) nor are you learning about non-polluting engines, because they sucked you in with fancy graphics I don't have for my superior engine systems, the ones you really need.

      Satan makes it looks so, so pretty. Free candy y'all come now, just pay your taxes and vote like the GOOD OBEDIENT SHEEP WE TRAINED YOU UP TO BE in return we will provide for you all the energy (even if it does kill all life on Earth).

      The nuclear wastes? haha They can be dumped in the ocean depths where they will Do No Harm.

      Trust us. Trust your Devil Daddy.

    • 9 months ago
  • remanns
  • KB723
    • +1
      KB723  

    • Laser technique to enrich uranium raises proliferation fears

      "A person would think that this kind of info would remain Hush Hush, especially when you bring Nuclear Proliferation into the mix"

    • 9 months ago
  • Vic_Romano
    • +1
      Vic_Romano  
    • KB723:

      There are different grades of enriched uranium. The type used for weapons is much more difficult to produce than reactor grade. While nuclear energy is pretty scary, I think that it's overall danger is less than coal fired plants. And solar, wind and tidal are simply too expensive to get online.

      It's going to be a tough debate, but our energy demands are going to have to be met somehow.

    • 9 months ago
  • KB723
  • Vic_Romano
    • +1
      Vic_Romano  
    • KB723:

      Let's just say that I'm no longer scared shitless about that nuclear plant in Nebraska flooding and melting down. However, the river is still flooding here and they say it's not going to get back to normal for at least another month.

      Fact of the matter is that designing a nuclear power plant is an engineering marvel in its own right. However, it's certainly not a feat to be taken without some serious caution and planning.

    • 9 months ago
  • KB723
    • +1
      KB723  
    • Vic_Romano:

      I think it would be a wise idea to not build them near any water sources...This could indeed be a new energy breakthrough but it does make me curious who this will be shared with... I don't think it's a wise idea to post such info on the net...

    • 9 months ago
  • Vic_Romano
  • KB723
    • +1
      KB723  
    • Vic_Romano:

      Than I would suggest man made reservoirs that are covered and secured... That in itself is a job creator... I do not Trust these folks using water that can or may make it's way back to the water wells we drink from...

    • 9 months ago
  • Vic_Romano
    • +1
      Vic_Romano  
    • KB723:

      Yep. Like I said, it's a huge feat of engineering. What's really scary is to look at how old the majority of the facilities we built here, and the politics behind how GE and Westinghouse were able to build them.

    • 9 months ago
  • KB723
    • 0
      KB723  
    • Vic_Romano:

      I would guess that not only has technology advanced, but so have building techniques... There has to be a way to fix these old reactors or just get rid of them and start on a new Platform...

    • 9 months ago
  • Gravity_Man
  • remanns
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