Nuclear Power

1. Nuclear Power Ryan Mullin George Ayoub Reagan Hardy Lexie Thompson

2. The Origin • In Chicago in 1942 scientists gathered in front of a clicking clocklike dial the source of the humming was coming from a pile of metal bricks that is now referred to by scientists as “the pile.” • Uranium was discovered in 1789 by Martin Klaeroth, a German chemist. • The element was named after the planet Uranus. • Radiation was discovered by Wilhelm Rontgen in 1895 by passing electric current through a glass tube producing x-rays. • In 1896 Henry Becquerel found that pitchblende, an ore containing radium, and uranium which caused a photographic plate to darken. • In the same year (1896) Pierre and Marie Wrie gave the name radioactivity to this nature. • In 1898, Samuel Prescott showed that radiation destroys bacteria in food. • In 1902 Ernest Rutherford showed that radioactivity as an event for emitting alpha or particles from the nuclei created a different element.

3. The Finding of Nuclear of Energy • Nuclear power can come from the fission of uranium, platinum, or the fission of hydrogen into helium. • You can find nuclear energy in uranium • Its also found in Kazakhastan in Canada and Australia, • Those are the 3 producers of uranium. • Uranium can be found in uranium mines.

4. The use of Nuclear Power • Generating homes • Generating buildings • Starting heating systems • Generating stadiums • Be used as an energy source • Uranium is abundant • The amount of waste produced is the least of any major energy production process. • Provides benefits other than electricity generation.

5. Equipment • To protect themselves from radiators workers wear protective suites to shield themselves from radiation. • Scientists wear safe protective clothing to measure the level of radioactivity in surrounding areas. • Nuclear energy workers wear special suites and respirators that become contaminated with low levels of radiation. • Workers wear suites to protect themselves from radiation they wear gasmasks and long suites with gloves. • The carry around an electrometer, a film badge, dose meter they wear special coveralls.

6. Nuclear Power Plant • Definition: “A nuclear power plant is a thermal power station in which the heat source is one or more nuclear reactors.” • Nuclear power plants offer clean energy that keeps us away from the dependence of fossil fuels. • Inside a nuclear power plant there are miles of power lines that lead to the nuclear reactor which generates the power plant. • There is a big generator that produces a spark in the turbine and then that turns the generator. • They produce a clean energy that adds little to air and water pollution. • There is a jet of steam that turns the turbine and the radio active uranium that heats the water into steam. • The water in the reactor serves as a cooler for the radio active material preventing it from over heating.

7. ProsandCons • Nuclear waste gives off dangerous radiation force much over 1,000 years. • Safely storing the waste is a HUGE problem. • All of the nuclear waste made in the United States over the last 40 years could cover a football field,15 feet deep. • Nuclear energy has several huge drawbacks. “ High-level” waste that emits strong radioactivity remains dangerous for hundreds- even thousands-of years. • No nuclear waste storage area is completely safe for workers. Also the waste sites must be securely guarded to prevent intruders. • Finally, as current storage areas fill up, we will need to build new, safe sites for future nuclear wastes. • Produces immense power from tiny amounts of fuel. • Nuclear fuels will last far longer than fossil fuels such as coal, oil, and natural gas burned in other power power plants. • Nuclear power plants produce “clean” energy that adds little to air and water pollution. • Fossil-fuel burning plants produce much pollution including acid rain. • Nuclear energy workers wear special suits and respirators that become contaminated with low levels of radiation. • For every kilogram of nuclear energy produced, it is the same as using 1,000 pounds of coal.

8. How Nuclear Power is Used to Make Steam • Definition: “ Nuclear fission is the nuclear reaction in which a heavy nucleus (such as Uranium) splits into two nuclei.” • Fission means breaking apart. • The reactor uses uranium as fuel. The heat is then generated from the fission. • Neutrons smash in the nucleus of uranium atoms, which split in half and releases energy in the form of heat. • Carbon dioxide is then pushed into a reactor to take the heat away and then steam is created.

9. Nuclear Waste • No nuclear waste storage area is completely safe for workers. • Also, the waste sights must be securely guarded to prevent intruders. • Some nuclear wastes are stored in caves or tunnels deep under the ocean bed. Earthquakes could crack the rocks and leak radioactivity. • Also, the waste could be set in water for a few years then mixed in with liquid glass, poured into a steel container and then set in a cement building until the radio activity wears off, which can take tens of thousands of years. • There is at least 3,530 cubic feet of radioactive waste each year.

10. Atomic Bomb • Definition:Terameans a trillion. • Definition:Jouleis a unit of energy. • Nuclear reactions happen when neutrons are fired at close atoms with heavy nuclei, these heavy nuclei break apart to form lighter nuclei when hit by the neutron, and generates more neutrons that hit the other nuclei, creating a chain reaction (fission). • When breaking down the nuclei rather than releasing energy through a chemical reaction. Atomic bombs release more than 80 tera per kilogram. • Bomb chain reactions happens by simply firing two half spheres of uranium isotope of a basic element, at one amount in a small chamber. • In new designs the uranium bomb core is surrounded by high-explosive lenses designed to compress the core upon detonation or with pressure is released on an object causing a blast. • The compressed core goes critical initiating the chain reaction that goes on until many of the heavy nuclei have broken apart.

11. Fun Facts! • Nuclear energy is released either by splitting atomic nuclei or by forcing the nuclei of atoms together. • Nuclear energy comes from mass-to-energy conversions that occur in the splitting of the atoms. • Nuclear energy is produced by a controlled nuclear chain reaction and creates heat-which is used to boil water, produce steam, and drive a steam turbine. • Nuclear power plants need less fuel than ones which burn fossil fuels. • In France, nuclear power is the most widespread, supplying 80 percent of the country’s electricity.

12. Fun Facts Part:2 • The basic fuel and reactors and Uranium. • Only a couple prototypes of a fast reactor has been built so far, one in Scotland, two in the United States, and one in France. • A fast reactor is a reaction that makes more fuel than it consumes. • To turn a fast reactor on and off, control rods are used fora material that absorbs neutrons, when they soak up many neutrons the reactor stops. When they absorb fewer neutrons the reactor speeds up.

13. BrainPop Video: Atoms and Nuclear Energy Atoms- www.brainpop.com/science/#80044 Nuclear Energy- www.brainpop.com/.webloc

14. Pop Quiz! • What is nuclear fission? _______________________________________ • What is the fuel for nuclear power? _______________________________________________ • What is a terajoule? _____________________________________________

15. Answer Key: • The splitting of atoms • Uranium • A trillion unit of energy

16. Bibliography • Jones, Andrew Zimmerman. “NuclearA fission.” About.com Physics. Andrew Zimmerman Jones, 2012. Web. 09 Mar. 2012 • WiseGeek. Ed. Conjecture Corporation. Conjecture 2003. Web 09. Mar. 2012. • Parker, Steve React: The Nuclear Energy Science Files. Bethesda, MD: Discovery Channel School, 1999. Print. • Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, Environmental Science. Holt, Reinhart, and Winston, Austin Texas, 2005. • Gibson, Diane. Sources of Energy Nuclear Power. North Mankato, Minnesota: Smart Apple Media, 1980. Print.