Ontario's power glut means possible nuclear plant shutdowns

[PamW]

20. Do you know where nuclear weapons "pits" came from?

No? Then there may be some costs buried elsewhere that have nothing to do with energy production.
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The "pits" of nuclear weapons start with the making of the plutonium at one of two materials production plants that used to be operated by the AEC, then ERDA, and now DOE. The two production facilities are locate at Hanford, Washington and Savannah River, South Carolina. Both these facilities have reactors to make plutonium and large chemical processing facilities to extract the plutonium. The plutonium was then sent to the Rocky Flats facility in Colorodo to be fashioned into pits. All 3 of these facilities are now shutdown. The USA decided a few decades ago that the USA had made all the plutonium needed for the arsenal. In order to refurbish pits when necessary for the W88; there is a facility located at Los Alamos National Laboratory for that.

The purpose of the facilities was NOT energy production. None of the reactors at Savannah River had a power plant connected to it. They just dumped the heat into the environment as waste heat. Most of the reactors at Hanford were the same way; the heat from those reactors was just dumped into the Columbia River. The one exception was the Hanford "N Reactor" that was commissioned by President Kennedy. It also had a power plant connected to it. Click on the top most picture for an enlarged view of President Kennedy dedicating the facility:

http://www.hanford.gov/page.cfm/NReactor

The last of Hanford’s nine plutonium production reactors to be built was the N Reactor. This reactor was called a dual purpose reactor in that it not only produced plutonium for America’s defense program, but it also generated electricity. It was the only reactor of its kind in the country.

PamW