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| Libya ’produced nuclear material’ |
| 2004-02-20 |
| The UN’s nuclear watchdog has said Libya managed to produce a small amount of plutonium using technology acquired on the black market. The International Atomic Energy Agency report did not specify the amount, but said it was not enough to make a nuclear bomb, diplomats said. ... The report said Libya secretly imported enriched uranium which it converted into plutonium, and engaged in other activities aimed at producing a nuclear weapon. I’m pretty sure that you can’t make plutonium without a reactor, so this shows that the Libyans had reached at least that stage of development. Plutonium let’s you make smaller, more compact warheads since the critical mass is lower. It’s harder to make a warhead since you implode it, whereas with a uranium bomb, you just gotta slam one chunk into another really hard. In WW2, we never tested the uranium design because the mechanics of it were considered a no brainer. Suggestion to Fred: Add a "WMD" or "proliferation" category for stories. |
| Posted by:11A5S |
| #1 The only way I know of to make plutonium is to generate it in a reactor. I believe that you get 250 ppm of Pu out of a uranium reactor after about 120 days. Then you have to let the uranium slugs sit awhile in a pool for about 30 days to get the short half-life but very nasty radioactive daughters to decay. Then you have to dissolve the slugs and go through a multi-stage chemical extraction process to separate plutonium from everything else. It is highly radioactive, highly toxic, and requires remote manipulation and generates some really nasty toxic and radioactive waste. This stuff requires a big investment and commitment of resources and people. Separation of U235 from U238 is a major process, but seems well adapted to regimes. Hire a bunch of NORK miners and build some big underground rooms. Pack em full of centrifuges, stop all the UF6 leaks and concentrate U235. It is hard to hide reactors because they will require a source of cooling that will give them away, either by the source or the IR heat signature. |
| Posted by: Alaska Paul 2004-2-20 3:10:49 PM |