4 ms·
No it isn't. Refining Uranium to the purity usable for bombs is notoriously difficult, much harder than is needed for power generation.
by usrn 4y ago
No it isn't. Refining Uranium to the purity usable for bombs is notoriously difficult, much harder than is needed for power generation.
- retrac 4y agoMost (all?) power reactor designs produce plutonium as a by-product, as with many small-scale reactors. For example, Canada built a small research reactor [1] in India in 1954, similar to many Canadian heavy water reactor designs. It was supplied with natural uranium. It was repurposed to manufacture several kilograms of plutonium per year. As I understand it, any country with power reactors and a decent industrial-engineering base - such as Finland, Canada, Japan, Argentina, etc. -- could, in principle, build a fission weapon on rather short notice. Separation of plutonium from reactor waste is a horribly nasty business, but not challenging in the same way as uranium enrichment. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIRUS_reactor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIRUS_reactor