B.1. Where is uranium found?
B.2. How did Australia get into the uranium business?
B.3. How is uranium used in atomic bombs?
B.4. How is uranium used in nuclear reactors to produce electricity?
B.5. Are there other uses for nuclear reactors?
B.6. Are the peaceful and military uses of uranium incompatible?
B.7. Has Australia ever produced plutonium for use in bombs?
B.8. Does Australia still sell uranium and plutonium for bombs?
B.9. Does Australian uranium still find its way into nuclear bombs?
B.10. Are there any other uses for uranium?
B.1. Where is uranium found? Tiny amounts of uranium are found almost everywhere. However, concentrated deposits of uranium (called ores) are found in just a few places, usually in hard rock or sandstone. These deposits are normally covered over with earth and vegetation.
In Australia (see the map below) uranium mining has taken place at Rum Jungle, Narbalek and South Alligator in the Northern Territory, at Mary Kathleen and Ben Lomond in northern Queensland, and at Radium Hill in South Australia, as well as pilot scale and exploratory development of other deposits across Australia.
Uranium has also been mined in the southwest United States, Canada, parts of Europe, the former Soviet Union, Namibia, South Africa, Niger and elsewhere.
In the early 1970s, large uranium deposits were discovered across Australia, particularly in the far north of the Northern Territory. However, due to significant community opposition and action, the Labour government, when it was swept to power in 1983, introduced the "Three Named Uranium Mines Policy" which prevented further expansion of Australia's uranium mining. However, when the Liberal/National Coalition was swept to power in March 1996, these restrictions were removed and a new phase of uranium mining is on the horizon.
In the past fifteen years, the province of Saskatchewan in Canada has become the uranium capital of the world. The richest uranium ores ever discovered have been found in the northern regions of this province.
B.2. How did Australia get into the uranium business?
After the end of World War II, the USA, USSR and the UK began developing extensive nuclear weapons programs, with many other countries attempting to follow in the same footsteps. In order to supply the uranium for it's rapidly expanding nuclear program, the British government requested the Australian government in the 40s to begin extensive exploration for uranium. in the mid-50s, the Rum Jungle and Radium Hill mines were opened and the uranium sold through the joint UK-USA Combined Development Agency (CDA).
Despite the newly developing image of the nuclear industry as a clean producer of electricity due to the nuclear power reactors at Obninsk (USSR), Shippingport (USA) and Calder Hall (UK), the primary focus of these facilities was the production of plutonium for military purposes. The uranium sold through the CDA was therefore almost certainly used for military-related activities, despite any other use it may have also been put to, such as electricity generation.
B.3. How is uranium used in atomic bombs? The explosive in the Hiroshima bomb was a rare kind of uranium, found in very low concentrations in every sample of uranium. The Nagasaki bomb was made from a different nuclear explosive material called plutonium. But plutonium -- the most commonly used nuclear explosive today -- has to be made from uranium. In fact, without uranium, none of the current nuclear weapons could have been built.
It is thought that the vast majority of Australia's uranium sold through the CDA was used primarily as a source material for uranium-235 and plutonium in military nuclear programs.
B.4. How is uranium used in nuclear reactors to produce electricity? In the 1960s, the nuclear fission process began to be used to produce electricity in special machines called nuclear reactors. These machines use controlled fission of uranium to generate heat in the core of the reactor, which is then transferred to a heat exchanger to boil water. The steam that is produced spins a turbine to make electricity. There are now hundreds of nuclear power stations worldwide.
Since the Three Mile Island accident in 1979, and especially since the Chernobyl accident in 1986, almost no new nuclear reactors have been sold. However, in 1990 Ontario Hydro (in Canada) announced that it wants to build about a dozen more. Indonesia recently announced plans for 12 nuclear reactors, but these plans were quickly postponed until 2020.
B.5. Are there other uses for nuclear reactors? Nuclear reactors fuelled with uranium can be used to produce artificial radioactive substances called "radioisotopes" for use in industry, scientific research and medicine. Alternatively, many of these radioisotopes can be produced in special machines called accelerators or cyclotrons, which do not require the use of uranium and do not involve the generation of high-level nuclear waste.
Nuclear reactors also serve to drive the propulsion units of nuclear submarines. In addition, special military reactors are used to produce most of the nuclear explosive materials used in nuclear weapons. Nuclear power cells are commonly used in space technology to power satelites also.
B.6. Are the peaceful and military uses of uranium incompatible?
In 1974, India exploded a bomb that was made from plutonium produced in a reactor given to the Indian government as a gift by the Canadian government. It was not an electricity-producing reactor, but a smaller machine called a "research reactor".
B.7. Has Australia ever produced plutonium for use in bombs?
B.8. Does Australia still sell uranium and plutonium for bombs?
B.9. Does Australian uranium still find its way into nuclear bombs?
Some of this cast-off uranium, called "depleted uranium", has been regularly used by the U.S. military in the construction of nuclear weapons. In fact, it is the raw material from which weapons-grade plutonium is created in special military reactors.
Depleted uranium is also used in the manufacture of metal components for the bomb itself, thereby doubling the explosive power of each warhead. The U.S. military makes no distinction between uranium of Australian origin and uranium of any other origin.
When Canadian uranium is enriched in the Soviet Union, Canada does not allow the USSR to keep the depleted uranium within its borders because of its military potential.
B.10. Are there any other uses for uranium? There are other uses for uranium, but they are less important due to it's ionising radiation. Some bullets are coated with uranium so that they can pierce through heavy armour. Some tanks are reinforced with uranium to make them stronger. Uranium is used as a weight in some airplanes and in the Cruise missiles tested in the Canadian arctic.
Special thanks to Dr Gordon Edwards, CCNR (http://ccnr.org/)
for permission to adapt this discussion guide from his original version.