What could we do with radioactive materials if they weren't radioactive?

[kladner]

In any case, the answer to the question of what we would do with radioactive materials if they weren't radioactive is, "Nothing." Without radioactivity, the earth would have become geologically dead long since, and none of us would be here.

Excellent point!

[xilman]

Originally Posted by Dr Sardonicus

Like the sales pitch for "Three Mile Island milk" -- "You won't need a light for your refrigerator!".

More people died at Chappaquiddick than at Three Mile Island, Which only goes to show that I'm showing my age.

I believe that Tc is used commercially as a corrosion inhibitor despite its mild radioactivity. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Techne...l_and_chemical

[Dr Sardonicus]

Originally Posted by xilman

More people died at Chappaquiddick than at Three Mile Island, Which only goes to show that I'm showing my age.
<snip>]

Two things stand out about it for me. One, the news media called it a disaster. They called it a catastrophe. I remember someone asking what they would have called it if someone had been killed.

Two, President Jimmy Carter went there and entered the control room at TMI-2 several days after the initial malfunction. The wisecracks about his visit having been on April Fool's Day notwithstanding, his willingness to go there did a lot to ease the locals' jittery nerves.

[Uncwilly]

Originally Posted by Dr Sardonicus

Two, President Jimmy Carter went there and entered the control room at TMI-2 several days after the initial malfunction. The wisecracks about his visit having been on April Fool's Day notwithstanding, his willingness to go there did a lot to ease the locals' jittery nerves.

He had a background in nuke tech:

In 1952, Carter began an association with the US Navy's fledgling nuclear submarine program, then led by Captain Hyman G. Rickover. Rickover's demands on his men and machines were legendary, and Carter later said that, next to his parents, Rickover was the greatest influence on his life. He was sent to the Naval Reactors Branch of the Atomic Energy Commission in Washington, D.C. for three month temporary duty, while Rosalynn moved with their children to Schenectady, New York. On December 12, 1952, an accident with the experimental NRX reactor at Atomic Energy of Canada's Chalk River Laboratories caused a partial meltdown resulting in millions of liters of radioactive water flooding the reactor building's basement and leaving the reactor's core ruined. Carter was ordered to Chalk River to lead a U.S. maintenance crew that joined other American and Canadian service personnel to assist in the shutdown of the reactor. The painstaking process required each team member to don protective gear and be lowered individually into the reactor for a few minutes at a time, limiting their exposure to radioactivity while they disassembled the crippled reactor.

from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_Carter#Naval_career

[storm5510]

Originally Posted by Uncwilly

He had a background in nuke tech:

from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_Carter#Naval_career

The story has it that Admiral Rickover kept a wooden chair in front of his desk. The legs on one side were shorter than on the other. He obviously had this chair to keep visits to his office brief. Perhaps he had it to see how potential candidates for his command could deal with the distraction of slowly sliding off his chair while being interviewed. A test of character and determination, possibly.

During the Gulf War in the early 1990's, it was mentioned that the turrets of Abrams Tanks were made of depleted Uranium. How much truth there is to this, I do not know.

[Dr Sardonicus]

Originally Posted by storm5510

<snip>
During the Gulf War in the early 1990's, it was mentioned that the turrets of Abrams Tanks were made of depleted Uranium. How much truth there is to this, I do not know.

I know that DU is used in armor plating, which tanks need, and also for armor-piercing munitions ("sabots"), which US tanks used to lethal effect in the Gulf War (Operation Desert Storm). Sabots pierce armor by delivering more energy more quickly than the armor can dissipate. As a result, the armor breaks (along with the sabot), and pieces shred whatever is inside. Uranium being chemically very active, DU sabot fragments also burn fiercely.

Sabots are also made from tungsten, which is almost as dense.

However, since depleted uranium is the complement of enriched uranium, it is essentially a waste product in the production of fuel for fission reactors, and has therefore been quite cheap.

[storm5510]

Originally Posted by Dr Sardonicus

...However, since depleted uranium is the complement of enriched uranium, it is essentially a waste product in the production of fuel for fission reactors, and has therefore been quite cheap.

For years, I believed depleted uranium was fuel removed from reactors which was unable to produce enough heat to create dry steam. The depleted fuel rods at Fukushima needing to be water-cooled thew my concept out the window, rapidly. I never knew it was a byproduct of the enrichment process. I would not think it would be totally inert in radiological terms.