Everything about The X-10 Graphite Reactor totally explained
The
X-10 Graphite Reactor at
Oak Ridge National Laboratory in
Oak Ridge, Tennessee, formerly known as the
Clinton Pile, was the world's second artificial
nuclear reactor (after
Enrico Fermi's
Chicago Pile) and was the first reactor designed and built for continuous operation.
When
President Roosevelt in December 1942 authorized the
Manhattan Project, the Oak Ridge site in eastern
Tennessee had already been obtained and plans laid for an air-cooled experimental pile, a
pilot chemical separation plant, and support facilities. The X-10 Graphite Reactor, designed and built in ten months, went into operation on
November 4,
1943. The reactor used
neutrons emitted in the
fission of
uranium-235 to convert
uranium-238 into a new element,
plutonium-239.
The reactor consists of a huge block of
graphite, measuring 24 feet on each side, surrounded by several feet of high-density concrete as a
radiation shield. The block is pierced by 1,248 horizontal diamond-shaped channels in which rows of cylindrical
uranium slugs formed long rods. Cooling air circulated through the channels on all sides of the slugs. After a period of operation, operators pushed fresh slugs into the channels from the face of the pile and the irradiated slugs would fall from the back wall through a chute into an underwater bucket. Following weeks of underwater storage to allow for
decay in radioactivity, the slugs were delivered to the chemical separation building.
The X-10 Graphite Reactor supplied the
Los Alamos laboratory with the first significant amounts of
plutonium. Fission studies of these samples from the X-10 heavily influenced bomb design. The X-10 chemical separation plant also proved the bismuth phosphate process that was used in the full-scale separation facilities at Hanford. Finally, the X-10 provided invaluable experience for engineers, technicians, reactor operators, and safety officials who then moved on to the
Hanford site.
After the war ended, the graphite reactor became the first facility in the world to produce radioactive
isotopes for peacetime use. On
August 2,
1946, ORNL director
Eugene Wigner presented a small container of
carbon-14 to the director of the Barnard Free Skin and Cancer Hospital, for medical use at the hospital in
St. Louis. The control room and reactor face are accessible to the public during scheduled tours offered through the
American Museum of Science and Energy.
Similar reactors
The X-10 reactor was similar in design to the
Windscale reactor in
Cumbria,
England, which was constructed for the
British Ministry of Supply and later operated by the
Atomic Weapons Establishment. One of the two reactors at Windscale
caught fire in 1957.
One reactor of similar design as the X-10 reactor is still in operation today the Belgian BR-1 reactor, which is used for scientific purposes, such as neutron activation analysis, neutron physics experiments and calibration of nuclear measurement devices.
Further Information
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