A nuclear power perspective

Morgan Hill Times reports on a perspective of  nuclear power.

Now that President Barack Obama has called for the resumption of the construction of commercial nuclear power plants, the following information may answer some questions.

The process for producing electricity from a nuclear plant is exactly the same as any fossil plant burning coal, oil or gas:

n water is heated to boiling and steam is routed to a turbine;

n the turbine spins a generator and out comes electricity.

The only difference between a fossil plant and a nuclear plant is the source of heat to boil the water. In a nuclear plant, the source of heat is the splitting of a rare uranium atom (U-235) which occurs naturally in uranium ore at a concentration of only 0.7 percent. The U.S. government controls the enrichment of U-235 to higher concentrations in large cascades of centrifuges.

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