What is the B Reactor at Hanford?
What is the B Reactor at Hanford?
Completed in September 1944, the B Reactor was the world’s first large-scale plutonium production reactor. As at Oak Ridge, the need for labor turned Hanford into an atomic boomtown, with the population reaching 50,000 by summer 1944.
Is Hanford reactor still active?
Today the Hanford site encompasses 586 square miles. Over time, the plutonium production complex grew to nine reactors, all now closed. Hanford is the site of the only operating nuclear power plant in the Northwest, the Columbia Generating Station operated by Energy Northwest.
Where in Washington was the atomic bomb made?
Hanford History
The Hanford Site sits on 586-square-miles of shrub-steppe desert in southeastern Washington State. Beginning in 1943, the site was used to produce plutonium for the bomb that brought an end to World War II.
How does the B Reactor Work?
The reactor produced plutonium-239 by irradiating uranium-238 with neutrons generated by the nuclear reaction. It was one of three reactors – along with the D and F reactors – built about six miles (10 km) apart on the south bank of the Columbia River.
What did the B Reactor do?
Created as part of the top secret Manhattan Project during World War II, B Reactor produced plutonium used in the Trinity Test, as well as for the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, to end World War II.
Is Richland radioactive?
The Hanford site near Richland in the southeastern part of the state produced about two-thirds of the plutonium for the nation’s nuclear arsenal, including the bomb dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, and now is the most contaminated radioactive waste site in the nation.
Is the Columbia River radioactive?
The Columbia River is sampled for possible radiation at several points in its journey to the Pacific Ocean. The river meets criteria set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for radioactivity in drinking water (less than 4 millirems per year).
Who built Hanford?
Environmental concerns As much as 75,000 gallons per minute was diverted from the Columbia River to cool the reactor. From 1944 to 1971, pump systems drew cooling water from the river and, after treating this water for use by the reactors, returned it to the river.