Civil Engineering with Atomic Detonations

ThesQuid writes "I just caught this article about China possibly using nuclear blasts to help build a hydro project in Tibet. I've always wondered why nobody has ever actually used nuclear explosives in civil engineering projects, if (and this is a BIG if) the blasts can be made reasonably radiologically clean." Several U.S. nuclear tests were devoted to exploring the feasibility of this; obviously we decided it wasn't such a great idea.

Comments

Re:small doses of radiation

[Ektanoor]

Once again I note:
"there are no radiological clean _blasts_ in nature"

A: Nuclear fission in an explosive device ALWAYS creates byproducts

B: Do not compare controlled energy event with UNCONTROLLED one. An explosion, even from a petard is ALWAYS UNCONTROLLED within the radius of the event. You may try to control the limits of the explosion not the explosion itself. and on what concerns nuclear devices this becames more problematic, due to the fact you are dealing with atoms and making a large blow of energy.

C: Nuclear blasts also IRRADIATE the environment through the whole spectre of light. So there can be several consequences, ranging from heat burns on living beings to formation of short-living isotopes. You may try to reach an "optimal" burn of the nuclear device. But what about the rest? Anyway you can't get rid off the gamma, alpha & beta rays.

D: A nuclear device creates isotopes. Several of them. They will live a N time. This N time ranges from hours to thousands of years. They are not only dangerous because they irradiate soemthing. They are also dangerous because they decay and are consequently the ground for mutations. Mutations that may not happen with you or your children but which will appear on your granson or grandchild.

E: Don't mess things between a controlled irradiation of humans/animals and such things as atomic weapons for military/engineering purposes. You stopped short here on claiming on small amounts are beneficial. Even some of the harshest levels of gamma rays are used to cure people with cancer. Levels that, if produced over the whole body, would give a few minutes/hours of life. Nearly enough to ask for the coffin, kiss your wife, and say bye to your kids...

Nuclear explosives for Interstate highways

[Animats]

Back in 1964, the California State Division of Highways seriously considered using nuclear explosives. The plan was to use 22 nuclear devices to help punch I-40 through the mountains between Barstow and Needles. Total planned yield was 1730 kilotons. The devices were to be emplaced in 30" diameter holes 340 to 780 feet in depth drilled into granite, with sand or pea gravel filled in after installing the bombs. It was expected that within four days after the explosions, workers could enter the site and start work on the highway.

The basic idea was that the radiation would mostly be contained inside the debris cone. Previous nuclear tests indicated that would happen. By modern standards, the release of radiation would have been unacceptable, but in the era of above-ground nuclear testing, this would have been considered a modest level of contamination.

Ref: 1964, "Engineering with Nuclear Explosives", Proceedings of the Third Plowshare Symposium, TID-7695, U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, Division of Technical Information. (Available from NTIS)

Project Chariot

[keil]

The U.S. gave up on a project to blast a harbor into park of Alaska using nuclear explosives.

http://arcticcircle.uconn.edu/VirtualClassroom/Cha riot/chariotindex4.html

A possible Indian "Ahem."

[Apuleius]

Dear Zhang:

We note with great interest that you have revived your program to divert waters from the Brahmaputra River. We note with similar interest that your Three Gorges Dam is nearing completion. You may care to note our recent success in joining the nuclear club. Allow me to explain how these are related:

Assuming your diversion project even works without a hitch, we have grave reasons to be displeased with it. Although Assam and Bangladesh usually do not lack for water, they will suffer several adverse consequences: you plan to retain these waters during dry spells and let them spill in their original course during we spells. This lets you stabilize your water supply. But it gravely destabilize ours, and we have enough trouble with flooding in the region as it is. Furthermore, your foolish idea will cause Bangladeshis to be increasingly reliant on their artesian waters, which are contaminated with arsenic. I'm sure that your PR flaks will bombard the Western media with promises that China would never, ever, use her dams in a way that would adversely affect India or Bangladesh. However, we note that your dams on the Mekong River have been quite the curse for Vietnam.

We don't need this. We're an emerging economic power, and after a long struggle for this we just this year became a net exporter of cereals. Now, the world is a little upset that we just developed a nuclear capacity. But the world will forgive us, especially the West, because we just had an orderly transfer of power from the Congress Party to the BJP, and the BJP has just made fools of many Chicken Littles who described India's new rulers as being to the right of Atilla the Hun. The world will note that an orderly transfer of power has not happened in your country's entire history.

Back to nukes. Wouldn't it suck if one of those things fell near the Three Gorges Dam? We think it would.

Call me up, Zhang, and we'll discuss better ways we can cooperate over water issues. We know how bad the water situation is in northwestern China, we know that people there have such salty water that they don't bother with table salt. We sympathise, we are not heartless. But don't be a fool.

Regards,

Vajpayee.

H-Bomb Re:The reason is simple

[StandardDeviant]

I'm not a weapons designer, but to my knowledge, all current thermonuclear packages require an initiator stage consisting of 1+ "ordinary" nuclear devices (U-235 or plutonium squeeze devices). So while the main stage may not kick out a lot of (long-term) radiation, you can bet your bottom dollar the initiator device(s) will. Further more, the earth around the device will become irradiated and amplify the fallout effect of the original device (and contaminate rain on its way to the water table). This is why the fallout from a military target like missle silos was always assumed to be much worse because the device would have to detonate at or near ground level as opposed to miles up for a "soft" civilian target like a city.

The United States looked into using nuclear devices for civil engineering in the 1950s and 1960s. For example, string a line of devices and you can make an instant shipping canal. The only problem is that the environmental side effects would be extreme. A rough rule of thumb I've heard quoted is that the amount of earth eliminated by the detonation in cubic meters was equal to the yield of the device assuming it was placed properly (100kT device = 100,000 m^3 earth gone). The devices used for this sort of thing were not in the thermonuclear yield range (megaton TNT equivalent or above). If the Chinese are thinking along the lines of the earlier plans, I'd guess their charges will be

As a side bit of trivial, you'd be amazed at the number of things we (US) thought of using "small" devices for during the 50's and 60's: civil engineering, fighter-deployed anti-aircraft missles (sure, 1 missle = a squadron of Russian bombers, but I'm sure the folks down wind of that will be _real_ happy...), anti-tank mines, and Jeep-mounted nuke rockets where the range of the missle was less that the lethal radius of the device (I think weapon system was refered to as the Patriot or the Bowie or something like that).

Random rambling at 3am...

--

RTFD

[Ektanoor]

"I've always wondered why nobody has ever actually used nuclear explosives in civil engineering projects, if (and this is a BIG if) the blasts can be made reasonably radiologically clean."

First - the article mentions Soviet Union as the only country who used nuclear devices for civil pruposes.

Second - Yes USSR did it. And the consequences have shown that it is not worth to do it again. Radiaton and several other factors make the use of nuclear devices a big problem. Until now there are a few places on the Urals and Ukraine that give trouble due to the levels of radiation. One of them is located right on one of the biggest coal basins of the world where population density is quite high.

Third - curiously, during this year, I have noted several references on the net related to civil use of nuclear explosives. So it amazes me a little that someone talks about "radiological clean" blasts. There are no radiological clean nuclear blasts in nature and it is stupid to claim such thing.

Fourth - Some people may not be aware of this. The problem with nuclear explosions is not only related to radiation but also to how you can control it. Nuclear blasts cannot be fully predictable. Sometimes calculations make errors of of 2-3 times or even more. Second the blasting of a device and the failure of the fission/fusion process can be of unpredictable consequences. Imagine if such situation happens in this dam(n) project. You risk to poison the entire Eastern Asia, the most populated place on Earth.

Fifth - If you know History than you may see that China's government has a harsh dossier on what relates to use of nuclear devices. During Cold War they made an experiment where they dropped thousands of soldiers near an atmospheric nuclear blast. If we compare the pictures to American and Russian military "rabbits", these guys were completely naked to radiation effects. Now I know what radiation may cause to someone. I had a neighbor who slowly died from radiation from exactly one of these military "experiments". He was equipped according to all standards and still radiation caught him. The picture is horrible. Think about a guy that pushes one leg while walking, lost nearly all teeth, nearly cannot speak, his skin completely burned and having cancer slooooooowly eating his bones. The most horrible is that he is living 20 YEARS with this.

Radiation is a snipper you see only two late. Myself I got burned from a radiation "hot spot" near Kiev, less then two years after Chernobyl. I never guessed what was happening on my right limb until one friend told me they had found the spot in that place (I got the equivalent of a 1 degree burn that took just 6 monthes to heal).

Sometimes I wonder if people do read the articles before posting here. Sincerly the average IQ, quality and quantity of Slashdot articles have downgraded drastically for the last time. Time for you people to seriously think about this or soon this will be News for Gooks. Stuff that mutters.

It HAS been used in civil engineering

[Capt. Beyond]

Well, sorta...
This Report states that in Colorado, during the years 1969-1971, Project Rulison, tried to stimulate natural gas production. In 1969, a 43 kiloton fission-type nuclear device was detonated at a depth of 8,426 feet, on Colorado's western slope.