Document vBGL62N8n3270E0Ovw6r8JGq9

If America moving ahead an atomic energy? Facts are hard to come by. Production rates, costs and resources are all 'top secret'--even the nature of problems ahead and tethnU cal reasons for policy deci sions are, too- In this situa tion, our Washington Bureau reexamines the whole atom ic-energy program. Wti think we have as clear a picture as f-*Ona of the moin production oroos In the Hanford Plutonium foCtory. Its process [ ' inverts the plentiful U238 Into the fissionable element known os plutonium is available fo an outsider POWER Reports--Where America N Number One job of (be Atomic Energy Commission is to keep the warbuilt plants runniog, to maintain the bomb production achieved by the Mao' hattan District. On this thero has been no faltering, no Interruption of pro* duetion. - At Oak Ridge, efficiency in the sep* aration of fissionable uranium has been greatly stepped up. At Hanford, pro* daction of plutonium has been main* tallied in the face of great obstacle*. Equally important with operation of existing plants, for the tong haul, la the job of advancing the atomic art. In military terms, this means: Does the U. 5. wait for the reat of the world to catch up with its wartime achieve* menu, or doe* It push ahead with the development of more end better weapons? In technical terms: Are Americans learning more about wbai goes on in the atomic nucleus, about how to eon* trol atomic reactions; are the theo* retieal possibilities being reduced to engineering practice? The limping irort. At this level, no such unqualified endorsement can yet ho given to the government's program. Six months or so ago it would have been necessary to report that (he for* ward-thrusting phase of atom work was in a state of near stagnation. Prepara tions for a new end bigger plutonium plant were enmeshed in engineering and personnel difficulties. Weapons re* search was at loose ends* Construction of new types of atomle reactor* was being held up by vacilla* lion and Indecision In the AEC. Throughout tba atom project morale was low. Many technical people were leaving; many of those who remained were discouraged end uncertain. But last summer the year-old AEC began to get a grip on Us huge job. Things began to improve. Today the situation is still spotty--good here, bad there, but everywhere on the mend. Now OH Doed Center. The program that A EC has now taken off dead center and is beginning to push along is above all an armament program. The way the world goes now, the commissioners fig* ure that production of bombs takes pre cedence over everything else. Atomic power problems in general are being tackled in a conservative, step-by-step way. The wartime method of bulling ahead has been dropped. Not only is AEC'e program a military one--it is a rather narrowly military one. Even such projects as atomic pro pulsion of warships, bombing planes. and missiles are subordinated to pfo duclion of explosives. The Atom Rants. The first atomic bomb was completed early in July IMS. U was charged with plutonium tad was detonated on the sixteenth st Ala mogordo, N. M. Two weeks later a, uranium bomb was dropped on H>mshims, and three days after that so other plutonium bomb was dropped 00 Nagasaki. At that point, the U. S. had exhausted /ts supply of bombs. For nearly three years, since thea, the atom bomb plants have been run ning day and night building up a stock pile of bombs. How fast? People who ; have any information . refrain f ` guessing. But a common view am**! men who only know what they ttsi (n the Smyth Report ia that talk of prw duclion rates in the hundreds or thou sands of bombs Is fantastic. Whatever the rote actually may be it Is scheduled to be maintained until fata next year or early 1950. At that time, new facilities at Hanford, W* ington, will begin to bring in additions* production. By 1952, when these fscH* ties ore completed, total bomb prodw* . tion should bo substantially inere****- POWfifi |HI from corrosion. A fission chain reac tion takes place in the U235 content of Stands in 1948 the uranium. After a while, the uranium slugs are removed, dissolved io odd and put through a series of precipitations and resolutions which finally separate out a the l). S. came out of the war with I. s bomb industry consisting o! four asjer plants: two at Oak Ridge to eep* * uiie the natural explosive, uranium * one at Hanford to produce the irmhetie explosive, plutonium; one at Lei Aitraos to assemble bombs using l these explosives. ' Oak Rldoo Plant. In plant K-25 at Oak Ridge, uranium, combined with - faerie* to form a gas, is forced through ' thousands of stages of porous memtaws. The lighter fissionable isotope, ,, UU5, goes through tho "sieve'* a little ' e>*re easily (ban the heavier U23& So t *bn comes out at the far end is enrritbed U135. facilities of ihe K-25 type. But K-25 itself will be kepi running indefinitely --certainly os long as accumulation of bombs hsi a top priority. And' even alter that, there'll be uses (or eon* centroted U235. Production of enriched fuel, for instance, (or reactors. Who* About Hanford? No such postwar increase in output has been achieved at the third explosive plant-- the Hanford Engineer Works. As amatter of fact, it Is a technical miracle that production has been held up to (be wartime level. The three Hanford units utUlte proc esses thsi had never occurred on earth until December, 1942. the plutonium--the end product of the process. The plutonium leaves a problem be hind it--in the form of tons and tons of a mixture 0/ working chemicals, water, uranium and fission products. These last possess radioactivity, which takes years to die away and it to in tense it breeds contamination to the point where the whole mass must be handled from behind lead or concrete. At present this deadly mass Is simply stockpiled (or later extraction of the uranium. But proper storage is tough. For example, leakage eould contam inate the water supply of a whole region, but AEC is confident that the measures K-25 has been by far the most sue`''cessful of (he atom plants. Almost from * `he start it rta without serious, diffi!, follies. Nevertheless, AEC bolds tbst, : technically, K-2S is a blind alley. For ,-ae (king, K-25 Is tho most expensive **d difficult to build of all tho plant tas. More important, it is intrinsic- At Hanford no effort is made at the lough separation of 1)255 from U23B. Instead, tho U235 is "burned up" in a chain-reacting pile. In its burniog, It transmutes a little of the inert 0236 into another element, plutonium, never found In nature. Plutonium >s fissionable. And--very it takes obviate any danger. Despite all its difficulties, the plu tonium process la the one on which everyone banks for the future; So AEC has started a tremendous expansion program at Hanford as its major move to step up bomb production. One port of the program is just to j sDy wasteful of nuclear fuel. It ext J**4 (be aatutally fissionable 0.7% important--it differs chemically from uranium. So then the plutonium can be modemiee tho three existing units-- particularly, one assumes, in their , bwu artoiutn and discards tho nonV fesiftcsble U23B. separated by comparatively straightforward chemical methods. chemical phases. New Plutonium Plant Planned. But m Hanlord process, on the other W b*ad, offers tht ptomise of ulUixtag the P, Hmdhl U23B by transmuting it Into K T^ibcisl, snd fissionable, element B- wntoniom. Each of the Hanford piles is essen tially a storlea.higli block of ultra-pure graphite encased In some leet of con crete shielding. Into this block are In serted slugs of metallic uranium sealed the really big job (s the construction et the Hanlord site o( a complete plu tonium plant. The new plant isn't going to differ fundamentally from the old one. It'D use fairly conventional gra K So then are no plans for additional Into aluminum cans to protect them phite-moderated piles with natural. Hay 1046 (?) ts