April 1, 2009
Nuclear Energy and Nuclear Proliferation
Professor Harold Feiveson
Woodrow Wilson School
Minutes of the 25th Meeting of the 67th Year
The 25th meeting of the 67th year was called to order at 10:15 AM in the Friend Center Convocation Room. President George Hansen presided and led the invocation.
Guests were Bob Cagers, introduced by Jim Johnson, and Peter Bonanos, introduced by Michael Kaplan. Estimated attendance was 110.
Mellick Bellshaw read the minutes of the March 25 meeting, at which Philip Pettit spoke on the topic “How Scholarship Has Influenced Democracy in Spain.” A moment of silence was observed in memory of Henry Maso, who died on March 2. It was announced that the next meeting will be held on April 8, 10:15 AM at Friend Center. Jim Wickenden, President, Wickenden Associates, Princeton, will speak on “College Admissions.”
Ruth Miller introduced the speaker, Dr. Harold Feiveson, an expert in nuclear weapons and nuclear energy policy. He is co-founder and Senior Research Policy Analyst at Princeton’s Program on Science and Global Security, Lecturer at the Woodrow Wilson School, and editor of the international journal, Science & Global Security.
Dr. Feiveson described three of the Princeton group’s studies – on nuclear power, nuclear weapons, and nuclear proliferation.
His discussion of nuclear power focused on breeder reactors. Breeders generate more plutonium fuel than is burned up, but they require expensive fuel reprocessing and handling of large amounts of separated plutonium. During the early 1970’s the Dept. of Energy projected that by 2010 there would be 2000 nuclear plants in the US, most of them breeders. The Princeton group’s first study concluded that the projection was unrealistic and uneconomic, and helped bolster the government’s political decision in 1977 to terminate the breeder program. Today there are only about 100 US nuclear plants, not 2000.
The breeder concept reappeared in 2006 in the proposed Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, which addresses the problem of disposing of radioactive nuclear waste. In this approach modified breeder reactors burn reprocessed spent fuel from light water reactors. The Princeton group concluded from economic and technical studies that GNEP does not make sense, and Feiveson believes that it will not survive in congress.
The speaker next summarized the Princeton group’s studies on nuclear weapons strategy. These have been published in the 1999 book,”The Nuclear Turning Point – a Blueprint for Deep Cuts and De-alerting of Nuclear Weapons”. The first thing to grasp about the nuclear strategy of the US and the Soviet Union in the Cold War, Feiveson said, is how lunatic it was. Each side built up an arsenal of 30,000 nuclear weapons. The US targeted 1000 ground zeros for first strike with 3000 nuclear warheads, each 10 times the size of the Hiroshima bomb, with an estimated global death toll of 400 million people. Today, although many believe that the greatest dangers nuclear weapons pose for the United States are their proliferation and having them fall into the hands of terrorists, the US and Russia still have some 5000 weapons each. The Princeton group made detailed recommendations and proposals on how that number could be reduced to the low hundreds and taken off high-alert status..
Feiveson described his surreal visit to the US Strategic Command headquarters in Omaha. A few weeks earlier the commanding general of US nuclear forces had hosted a dinner there. The guest was his Russian counterpart, the commander of Russian strategic nuclear forces. The Russian general (previously identified by the CIA as an avid sports fan), was moved to tears at the dinner when he was presented with a basketball signed by Michael Jordan.
On the topic of nuclear proliferation, Feiveson described the Iranian centrifuge plant for uranium enrichment. From international inspections the centrifuges are known to be set up to produce only lightly enriched uranium for power reactors. The conclusion of the Princeton group’s analysis is that it would take 1 to 2 1/2 years to reconfigure the plant to produce highly enriched uranium and generate enough material for one nuclear weapon.
Feiveson concluded with remarks about the International Panel on Fissile Materials, a group founded a few years ago by scientists from Princeton and from other countries, to provide technical analyses needed for policy making on arms control. To illustrate the urgency of control, it takes 50 lb of highly enriched uranium to make a bomb, and there are about 1000 tons of highly enriched uranium around the world today. In fact, as a result of US imports of uranium reactor fuel from the Russian stockpile, up to10% of US electricity is being generated from Soviet bomb materials.
One sign of progress is that at least the US, Russia, France, United Kingdom, and China are no longer producing fissile material for weapons. A second was pointed out by Ruth Miller in the introduction. On the day of this talk, President Obama and Russian President Medvedev, in London, agreed to start negotiations on a nuclear arms reduction treaty.
Respectfully submitted,
Joe Giordmaine
Guests were Bob Cagers, introduced by Jim Johnson, and Peter Bonanos, introduced by Michael Kaplan. Estimated attendance was 110.
Mellick Bellshaw read the minutes of the March 25 meeting, at which Philip Pettit spoke on the topic “How Scholarship Has Influenced Democracy in Spain.” A moment of silence was observed in memory of Henry Maso, who died on March 2. It was announced that the next meeting will be held on April 8, 10:15 AM at Friend Center. Jim Wickenden, President, Wickenden Associates, Princeton, will speak on “College Admissions.”
Ruth Miller introduced the speaker, Dr. Harold Feiveson, an expert in nuclear weapons and nuclear energy policy. He is co-founder and Senior Research Policy Analyst at Princeton’s Program on Science and Global Security, Lecturer at the Woodrow Wilson School, and editor of the international journal, Science & Global Security.
Dr. Feiveson described three of the Princeton group’s studies – on nuclear power, nuclear weapons, and nuclear proliferation.
His discussion of nuclear power focused on breeder reactors. Breeders generate more plutonium fuel than is burned up, but they require expensive fuel reprocessing and handling of large amounts of separated plutonium. During the early 1970’s the Dept. of Energy projected that by 2010 there would be 2000 nuclear plants in the US, most of them breeders. The Princeton group’s first study concluded that the projection was unrealistic and uneconomic, and helped bolster the government’s political decision in 1977 to terminate the breeder program. Today there are only about 100 US nuclear plants, not 2000.
The breeder concept reappeared in 2006 in the proposed Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, which addresses the problem of disposing of radioactive nuclear waste. In this approach modified breeder reactors burn reprocessed spent fuel from light water reactors. The Princeton group concluded from economic and technical studies that GNEP does not make sense, and Feiveson believes that it will not survive in congress.
The speaker next summarized the Princeton group’s studies on nuclear weapons strategy. These have been published in the 1999 book,”The Nuclear Turning Point – a Blueprint for Deep Cuts and De-alerting of Nuclear Weapons”. The first thing to grasp about the nuclear strategy of the US and the Soviet Union in the Cold War, Feiveson said, is how lunatic it was. Each side built up an arsenal of 30,000 nuclear weapons. The US targeted 1000 ground zeros for first strike with 3000 nuclear warheads, each 10 times the size of the Hiroshima bomb, with an estimated global death toll of 400 million people. Today, although many believe that the greatest dangers nuclear weapons pose for the United States are their proliferation and having them fall into the hands of terrorists, the US and Russia still have some 5000 weapons each. The Princeton group made detailed recommendations and proposals on how that number could be reduced to the low hundreds and taken off high-alert status..
Feiveson described his surreal visit to the US Strategic Command headquarters in Omaha. A few weeks earlier the commanding general of US nuclear forces had hosted a dinner there. The guest was his Russian counterpart, the commander of Russian strategic nuclear forces. The Russian general (previously identified by the CIA as an avid sports fan), was moved to tears at the dinner when he was presented with a basketball signed by Michael Jordan.
On the topic of nuclear proliferation, Feiveson described the Iranian centrifuge plant for uranium enrichment. From international inspections the centrifuges are known to be set up to produce only lightly enriched uranium for power reactors. The conclusion of the Princeton group’s analysis is that it would take 1 to 2 1/2 years to reconfigure the plant to produce highly enriched uranium and generate enough material for one nuclear weapon.
Feiveson concluded with remarks about the International Panel on Fissile Materials, a group founded a few years ago by scientists from Princeton and from other countries, to provide technical analyses needed for policy making on arms control. To illustrate the urgency of control, it takes 50 lb of highly enriched uranium to make a bomb, and there are about 1000 tons of highly enriched uranium around the world today. In fact, as a result of US imports of uranium reactor fuel from the Russian stockpile, up to10% of US electricity is being generated from Soviet bomb materials.
One sign of progress is that at least the US, Russia, France, United Kingdom, and China are no longer producing fissile material for weapons. A second was pointed out by Ruth Miller in the introduction. On the day of this talk, President Obama and Russian President Medvedev, in London, agreed to start negotiations on a nuclear arms reduction treaty.
Respectfully submitted,
Joe Giordmaine