Super Eco

Photo credit: Paula Pandey Chhetri on stock.xchng

I work in the nuclear energy sector—kind of ironic that I write for an eco site, isn't it! Anyway, my current role is in nuclear waste management. Most of the time when we are performing a clean up operation or decommissioning an old site, we have good documentation to help us plan the work so there are no surprises.

However, every once in a while, we encounter something unexpected—nothing we can't handle, because we are trained to work with radioactivity—but it does make the job more challenging.

That's what happened at the Department of Energy Hanford Site in Washington State back in 2004, although they did not realize the historical significance of the find until recently. The Hanford site had manufactured plutonium for the first nuclear weapons test at Trinity, as part of the Manhattan Project, and also for the Fat Man nuclear weapon that was used to strike Nagasaki at the end of World War II.

During a clean-up dig in 2004, a rusted metal safe was uncovered, and a glass jug containing 400 millilitres of plutonium solution was discovered inside the safe. Through analysis of the plutonium, and confirmation from historical records at Hanford, the team of scientists determined that the material in question was in fact from the first batch of plutonium produced for these weapons.

The scientists believe that it was not used because the safe had been previously contaminated. Modern techniques allowed for safe retrieval of the material without exposure to personnel or the environment.

Because of the age and purity of the plutonium—99.96 percent—it will be used to create a reference sample for research purposes—beating swords into ploughshares.

Luckily Homer Simpson wasn't around—he'd probably have made a peanut butter and plutonium sandwich!