The Bush administration is planning the government’s first production since the Cold War of plutonium 238, stirring debate over the risks and benefits of the deadly material. The hot substance, valued as a power source, is so radioactive that a speck can cause cancer.
Federal officials say the program would produce a total of 330 pounds over 30 years at the Idaho National Laboratory, a sprawling site outside Idaho Falls some 100 miles to the west and upwind of Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming.
Officials say the program could cost $1.5 billion and generate more than 50,000 drums of hazardous and radioactive waste.
Project managers say most if not all of the new plutonium is intended for secret missions and declined to divulge any details. But in the past, it has powered espionage devices.
“The real reason we’re starting production is for national security,” Timothy Frazier, head of radioisotope power systems at the Department of Energy, said in a recent interview.
Frazier vigorously denied that any of the classified missions would involve nuclear arms, satellites or weapons in space.
The laboratory is a source of pride and employment for many residents in the Idaho Falls area. But the secrecy is adding to unease in western Wyoming, where environmentalists are scrutinizing the production plan – made public late Friday – and considering whether to fight it.
They say the production effort is a potential threat to nearby eco systems, including Yellowstone National Park, Grand Teton National Park and the area around Jackson Hole.
Plutonium 238 has no central role in nuclear arms. Instead, it is valued for its steady heat, which can be turned into electricity. Batteries made of it are best known for powering spacecraft that go where sunlight is too dim to energize solar cells, such as the Cassini probe exploring Saturn and its moons.
Federal and private experts not connected to the project said the new plutonium would probably power devices for conducting espionage on land and under the sea. Even if no formal plans exist to use the plutonium in space for military purposes, these experts said the material could be used by the military to power compact spy satellites that would be hard for adversaries to track, evade or destroy.
Early in the nuclear era, the government became fascinated by plutonium 238 and used it to make batteries that worked for years or decades. Scores of them powered satellites, planetary probes and spy devices, at times with disastrous results.
In 1964, a rocket failure led to the destruction of a navigation satellite powered by plutonium 238, spreading radioactivity around the globe and starting a debate over the event’s health effects.
In 1965, high in the Himalayas, an intelligence team caught in a blizzard lost a plutonium-powered device meant to spy on China. And in 1968, an errant weather satellite crashed into the Pacific Ocean, but federal teams managed to recover its plutonium battery intact.
Such accidents cooled enthusiasm for the batteries. But federal agencies continued to use them for a more limited range of missions, including those involving deep-space probes and devices for tapping undersea cables.
Plutonium 238 is hundreds of times more radioactive than the the plutonium 239 used in nuclear arms. Medical experts agree that inhaling even a speck poses a serious risk of lung cancer.
But federal experts say the risk of human exposure is extraordinarily low.
Today, the U.S. makes no plutonium 238 and instead relies on aging stockpiles or imports. Washington now wants to resume production. The U.S. last made plutonium 238 in the 1980s at a Savannah River plant in South Carolina.
A 500-page draft environmental-impact statement has been posted at www.consolidationeis.doe.gov. The public has 60 days to respond. Frazier said the Department of Energy hopes to finish the plan early in 2006. The president would then submit it to Congress for approval.
About plutonium 238
What it looks like: A silvery-gray metal that becomes yellowish when exposed to air. It is solid under normal conditions and chemically reactive.
What it is: Plutonium has at least 15 isotopes, all of which are radioactive. The most common ones are Pu-238, Pu-239 and Pu-240. Pu-238 has a half-life of 87.7 years.
What is does: Unlike plutonium 239, plutonium 238 is not useful for nuclear weapons. It generates significant heat through its decay process, which makes it useful as a power source. Using a thermo couple, a device that converts heat into electric power, satellites rely on plutonium as a power source. Tiny amounts also provide power to heart pacemakers.
Source: Environmental Protection Agency website