![Alabama Ordnance Works (1)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/49/Alabama_Ordnance_Works_%281%29.jpg)
The P-9 Project was the codename given during
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
to the
Manhattan Project
The Manhattan Project was a research and development undertaking during World War II that produced the first nuclear weapons. It was led by the United States with the support of the United Kingdom and Canada. From 1942 to 1946, the project w ...
's
heavy water production program. The
Cominco
Teck Resources Limited, known as Teck Cominco until late 2008, is a diversified natural resources company headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia, that is engaged in mining and mineral development, including coal for the steelmaking indust ...
operation at
Trail, British Columbia
Trail is a city in the West Kootenay region of the Interior of British Columbia, Canada. It was named after the Dewdney Trail, which passed through the area. The town was first called Trail Creek or Trail Creek Landing, and the name was shorten ...
, was upgraded to produce heavy water.
DuPont
DuPont de Nemours, Inc., commonly shortened to DuPont, is an American multinational chemical company first formed in 1802 by French-American chemist and industrialist Éleuthère Irénée du Pont de Nemours. The company played a major role in ...
built three plants in the United States: at the Morgantown Ordnance Works, near
Morgantown, West Virginia
Morgantown is a city in and the county seat of Monongalia County, West Virginia, Monongalia County, West Virginia, United States, situated along the Monongahela River. The largest city in North-Central West Virginia, Morgantown is best known as th ...
; at the
Wabash River Ordnance Works, near
Dana and
Newport, Indiana
Newport is a town in Vermillion Township, Vermillion County, in the U.S. state of Indiana. The population was 515 at the 2010 census. The town is the county seat of Vermillion County.
History
A post office has been in operation at Newport since ...
; and at the
Alabama Ordnance Works, near
Childersburg
Childersburg is a city in Talladega County in the U.S. state of Alabama. It was incorporated in 1889. At the 2020 census, the population was 4,754. It has a history dating back before 1540, when it was noted as a village of the Coosa Nation vi ...
and
Sylacauga, Alabama
Sylacauga is a city in Talladega County, Alabama, United States. At the 2020 census, the population was 12,578.
Sylacauga is known for its fine white marble bedrock. This was discovered shortly after settlers moved into the area and has been ...
. The American plants operated from 1943 until 1945. The Canadian plant at Trail continued in operation until 1956. Three
nuclear reactor
A nuclear reactor is a device used to initiate and control a fission nuclear chain reaction or nuclear fusion reactions. Nuclear reactors are used at nuclear power plants for electricity generation and in nuclear marine propulsion. Heat from nu ...
s were built using the heavy water produced by the P-9 Project:
Chicago Pile 3
Chicago Pile-3 (CP-3) was the world's first heavy water reactor. One of the first research reactors, it was built in 1943 near Palos Hills, Illinois, original site of Argonne National Laboratory. Joining CP-1/CP-2, it first went critical on 15 ...
at
Argonne, and
ZEEP
The ZEEP (Zero Energy Experimental Pile) reactor was a nuclear reactor built at the Chalk River Laboratories near Chalk River, Ontario, Canada (which superseded the Montreal Laboratory for nuclear research in Canada). ZEEP first went critical a ...
and
NRX
NRX (National Research Experimental) was a heavy-water-moderated, light-water-cooled, nuclear research reactor at the Canadian Chalk River Laboratories, which came into operation in 1947 at a design power rating of 10 MW (thermal), increasing to ...
at the
Chalk River Laboratories
Chalk River Laboratories (french: Laboratoires de Chalk River; also known as CRL, Chalk River Labs and formerly Chalk River Nuclear Laboratories, CRNL) is a Canadian nuclear research facility in Deep River, about north-west of Ottawa.
CRL is a ...
in Canada.
Origins
Heavy water is a form of
water
Water (chemical formula ) is an inorganic, transparent, tasteless, odorless, and nearly colorless chemical substance, which is the main constituent of Earth's hydrosphere and the fluids of all known living organisms (in which it acts as a ...
that contains a larger than normal amount of the
hydrogen
Hydrogen is the chemical element with the symbol H and atomic number 1. Hydrogen is the lightest element. At standard conditions hydrogen is a gas of diatomic molecules having the formula . It is colorless, odorless, tasteless, non-toxic, an ...
isotope
Isotopes are two or more types of atoms that have the same atomic number (number of protons in their nuclei) and position in the periodic table (and hence belong to the same chemical element), and that differ in nucleon numbers (mass numbers) ...
deuterium
Deuterium (or hydrogen-2, symbol or deuterium, also known as heavy hydrogen) is one of two Stable isotope ratio, stable isotopes of hydrogen (the other being Hydrogen atom, protium, or hydrogen-1). The atomic nucleus, nucleus of a deuterium ato ...
, also known as heavy hydrogen, rather than the common
hydrogen-1
Hydrogen (1H) has three naturally occurring isotopes, sometimes denoted , , and . and are stable, while has a half-life of years. Heavier isotopes also exist, all of which are synthetic and have a half-life of less than one zeptosecond (10 ...
isotope that makes up most of the hydrogen in ordinary water. Deuterium was discovered by
Harold Urey
Harold Clayton Urey ( ; April 29, 1893 – January 5, 1981) was an American physical chemist whose pioneering work on isotopes earned him the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1934 for the discovery of deuterium. He played a significant role in the d ...
in 1931 and he was later able to concentrate it in water. His mentor
Gilbert Newton Lewis
Gilbert Newton Lewis (October 23 or October 25, 1875 – March 23, 1946) was an American physical chemist and a Dean of the College of Chemistry at University of California, Berkeley. Lewis was best known for his discovery of the covalent bond a ...
isolated the first sample of pure heavy water by
electrolysis
In chemistry and manufacturing, electrolysis is a technique that uses direct electric current (DC) to drive an otherwise non-spontaneous chemical reaction. Electrolysis is commercially important as a stage in the separation of elements from n ...
in 1933.
Although a scientific curiosity from the start, considerable interest in heavy water was aroused in 1939 when
Hans von Halban
Hans Heinrich von Halban (24 January 1908 – 28 November 1964) was a French physicist, of Austrian-Jewish descent.
Family
He was descended on his father's side from Polish Jews, who left Kraków for Vienna in the 1850s. His grandfather, Heinr ...
and
Lew Kowarski
Lew Kowarski (10 February 1907, Saint Petersburg – 30 July 1979, Geneva) was a naturalized French physicist. He was a lesser-known but important contributor to nuclear science.
Early life
Lew Kowarski was born in Saint Petersburg to Nicholas K ...
suggested that heavy water could be used as a
neutron moderator
In nuclear engineering, a neutron moderator is a medium that reduces the speed of fast neutrons, ideally without capturing any, leaving them as thermal neutrons with only minimal (thermal) kinetic energy. These thermal neutrons are immensely mo ...
in a
nuclear reactor
A nuclear reactor is a device used to initiate and control a fission nuclear chain reaction or nuclear fusion reactions. Nuclear reactors are used at nuclear power plants for electricity generation and in nuclear marine propulsion. Heat from nu ...
using natural
uranium
Uranium is a chemical element with the symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Uranium is weak ...
. They carried out experiments on uranium using ordinary water, but had found that the hydrogen atoms absorbed neutrons, thus preventing the desired chain reaction. Heavy water though, was an ideal moderator. The
Office of Scientific Research and Development
The Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD) was an agency of the United States federal government created to coordinate scientific research for military purposes during World War II. Arrangements were made for its creation during May 1 ...
(OSRD) put
Hugh S. Taylor
Sir Hugh Stott Taylor (6 February 1890 – 17 April 1974) was an English chemist primarily interested in catalysis.Who Was Who, Published by A&C Black Limited In 1925, in a landmark contribution to catalytic theory, Taylor suggested that a cat ...
, a British physicist at
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...
in charge of heavy water research. Taylor and Urey began looking at means for producing heavy water on an industrial scale. For his
plutonium
Plutonium is a radioactive chemical element with the symbol Pu and atomic number 94. It is an actinide metal of silvery-gray appearance that tarnishes when exposed to air, and forms a dull coating when oxidized. The element normally exhibi ...
project,
Arthur H. Compton
Arthur Holly Compton (September 10, 1892 – March 15, 1962) was an American physicist who won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1927 for his 1923 discovery of the Compton effect, which demonstrated the particle nature of electromagnetic radia ...
requested of it. The heavy water project was codenamed the "P-9 Project" in October 1942.
The problem with using heavy water was that it was scarce, and scientists could not readily acquire the quantities required by a reactor. At
Columbia University
Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...
in the United States,
Enrico Fermi
Enrico Fermi (; 29 September 1901 – 28 November 1954) was an Italian (later naturalized American) physicist and the creator of the world's first nuclear reactor, the Chicago Pile-1. He has been called the "architect of the nuclear age" and ...
and
Leó Szilárd
Leo Szilard (; hu, Szilárd Leó, pronounced ; born Leó Spitz; February 11, 1898 – May 30, 1964) was a Hungarian-German-American physicist and inventor. He conceived the nuclear chain reaction in 1933, patented the idea of a nuclear ...
attempted to use
graphite
Graphite () is a crystalline form of the element carbon. It consists of stacked layers of graphene. Graphite occurs naturally and is the most stable form of carbon under standard conditions. Synthetic and natural graphite are consumed on large ...
as a moderator instead. This turned out to be possible, but the graphite had to be very pure, as impurities, particularly
boron
Boron is a chemical element with the symbol B and atomic number 5. In its crystalline form it is a brittle, dark, lustrous metalloid; in its amorphous form it is a brown powder. As the lightest element of the ''boron group'' it has th ...
, tended to absorb neutrons. On 2 December 1942, Fermi's team initiated the first artificial self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction in an experimental reactor known as
Chicago Pile-1
Chicago Pile-1 (CP-1) was the world's first artificial nuclear reactor. On 2 December 1942, the first human-made self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction was initiated in CP-1, during an experiment led by Enrico Fermi. The secret development of t ...
. For the
Manhattan Project
The Manhattan Project was a research and development undertaking during World War II that produced the first nuclear weapons. It was led by the United States with the support of the United Kingdom and Canada. From 1942 to 1946, the project w ...
, this was a crucial step towards the manufacture of plutonium in a reactor for use in an
atomic bomb
A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission (fission bomb) or a combination of fission and fusion reactions (thermonuclear bomb), producing a nuclear explosion. Both bomb ...
, but much larger reactors were required for mass production.
Trail
Cominco
Teck Resources Limited, known as Teck Cominco until late 2008, is a diversified natural resources company headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia, that is engaged in mining and mineral development, including coal for the steelmaking indust ...
had been involved in heavy water research since 1934, and produced it at its
Teck Cominco smelter
The Teck Cominco smelter, also known as the Teck Cominco Lead-Zinc Smelter, Cominco Smelter, and Trail smelter located in Trail, British Columbia, Canada, is the largest integrated lead-zinc smelter of its kind in the world. It is situated approxi ...
plant in
Trail, British Columbia
Trail is a city in the West Kootenay region of the Interior of British Columbia, Canada. It was named after the Dewdney Trail, which passed through the area. The town was first called Trail Creek or Trail Creek Landing, and the name was shorten ...
. On 26 February 1941, the Canadian
National Research Council National Research Council may refer to:
* National Research Council (Canada), sponsoring research and development
* National Research Council (Italy), scientific and technological research, Rome
* National Research Council (United States), part of ...
inquired about its ability to produce heavy water. This was followed on 23 July 1941 by letter from Taylor that offered a
National Defense Research Committee
The National Defense Research Committee (NDRC) was an organization created "to coordinate, supervise, and conduct scientific research on the problems underlying the development, production, and use of mechanisms and devices of warfare" in the Un ...
(NDRC) contract to produce , for which the NDRC was prepared to pay $5 per pound for low-grade and $10 for high-grade heavy water. At the time it was selling for up to $1,130 a pound.
Cominco's president,
Selwyn G. Blaylock
Selwyn Gwillym Blaylock (February 18, 1879 – November 19, 1945) was a part of starting the mining industry in western Canada. He was president of Teck Resources, recipient of several international awards for his work in metallurgy, and was the P ...
, was cautious. There might be no post-war demand for heavy water, and the patent on the process was held by Albert Edgar Knowles, so a profit-sharing agreement would be required. In response, Taylor offered up $20,000 for plant modifications.
There the matter rested until 6 December 1941, when Blaylock had a meeting with the British physicist G. I. Higson, who informed him that Taylor had become discouraged with Cominco, and had decided to find an alternative source of heavy water. Blaylock invited Taylor to visit Trail, which he did from 5 to 8 January 1942. The two soon found common ground. Blaylock agreed to produce heavy water at Trail, and quickly secured approval from the chairman of the board, Sir
Edward Beatty. A contract was signed on 1 August 1942.
To the existing $10 million plant consisting of 3,215 cells consuming 75 MW of hydroelectric power, secondary electrolysis cells were added to increase the deuterium concentration in the water from 2.3% to 99.8%. For this process, Taylor developed a platinum-on-carbon
catalyst
Catalysis () is the process of increasing the rate of a chemical reaction by adding a substance known as a catalyst (). Catalysts are not consumed in the reaction and remain unchanged after it. If the reaction is rapid and the catalyst recyc ...
for the first three stages while Urey developed a nickel-
chromia
In Greek mythology, Chromia (; Ancient Greek: , ''Khrōmía'') was the daughter of Itonus, son of Amphictyon, himself son of Deucalion. She was also, in some traditions, the mother of Aetolus, Paeon, Epeius and Eurycyda by Endymion.
The poem ''E ...
one for the fourth stage tower. Seven new parcels of land were acquired totalling were leased by the U.S. government. Construction was undertaken by
Stone & Webster
Stone & Webster was an American engineering services company based in Stoughton, Massachusetts. It was founded as an electrical testing lab and consulting firm by electrical engineers Charles A. Stone and Edwin S. Webster in 1889. In the early ...
. The final cost was $2.8 million. The Canadian Government did not officially learn of the project until August 1942, shortly before construction began the following month. It was completed on 30 June 1943, at a cost of $2,604,622.
Production rose steadily from in June 1943 to in January 1944, in January 1945 and in January 1946. The running cost of the plant averaged $32,979 per month over the period from June 1943 to December 1946, when the Manhattan Project was replaced by the
Atomic Energy Commission. This worked out to $39 per pound. Trail's heavy water production continued until 1956.
American sites
![Alabama Ordnance Works (2)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b1/Alabama_Ordnance_Works_%282%29.jpg)
The Director of the Manhattan Project,
Brigadier General
Brigadier general or Brigade general is a military rank used in many countries. It is the lowest ranking general officer in some countries. The rank is usually above a colonel, and below a major general or divisional general. When appointed ...
Leslie R. Groves, Jr.
Lieutenant General Leslie Richard Groves Jr. (17 August 1896 – 13 July 1970) was a United States Army Corps of Engineers officer who oversaw the construction of the Pentagon and directed the Manhattan Project, a top secret research project ...
, had, in November 1942, recruited
DuPont
DuPont de Nemours, Inc., commonly shortened to DuPont, is an American multinational chemical company first formed in 1802 by French-American chemist and industrialist Éleuthère Irénée du Pont de Nemours. The company played a major role in ...
as the prime contractor for the construction of a plutonium production complex. Although DuPont's preferred designs for the nuclear reactors were helium cooled and used graphite as a moderator, DuPont still expressed an interest in using heavy water as a backup, in case the graphite reactor design proved infeasible for some reason. For this purpose, it was estimated that of heavy water would be required per month. As the plant at Trail, which was then under construction, could produce per month, more capacity was required.
Groves therefore authorized DuPont to establish additional heavy water facilities at the Morgantown Ordnance Works, near
Morgantown, West Virginia
Morgantown is a city in and the county seat of Monongalia County, West Virginia, Monongalia County, West Virginia, United States, situated along the Monongahela River. The largest city in North-Central West Virginia, Morgantown is best known as th ...
; at the
Wabash River Ordnance Works, near
Dana and
Newport, Indiana
Newport is a town in Vermillion Township, Vermillion County, in the U.S. state of Indiana. The population was 515 at the 2010 census. The town is the county seat of Vermillion County.
History
A post office has been in operation at Newport since ...
; and at the
Alabama Ordnance Works, near
Childersburg
Childersburg is a city in Talladega County in the U.S. state of Alabama. It was incorporated in 1889. At the 2020 census, the population was 4,754. It has a history dating back before 1540, when it was noted as a village of the Coosa Nation vi ...
and
Sylacauga, Alabama
Sylacauga is a city in Talladega County, Alabama, United States. At the 2020 census, the population was 12,578.
Sylacauga is known for its fine white marble bedrock. This was discovered shortly after settlers moved into the area and has been ...
. Although known as Ordnance Works and paid for under
Ordnance Department
The United States Army Ordnance Corps, formerly the United States Army Ordnance Department, is a Combat service support (United States), sustainment branch of the United States Army, headquartered at Fort Lee (Virginia), Fort Lee, Virginia. The ...
contracts, they were built and operated by the
. Locating them at Ordnance plants saved the cost of acquiring land, since it was already owned by the government, and they already had personnel and utilities, including steam generating equipment. The three American plants used a process different from Trail's; heavy water was extracted by distillation, taking advantage of the slightly higher boiling point of heavy water. This was not considered to be an efficient process, but it was known to work and scale to an industrial process, and therefore represented less risk than other proposals. Morgantown, Wabash and Alabama were expected to produce , and respectively of heavy water per month, with a concentration of 99.75%.
Morgantown
The Morgantown Ordnance Works (MOW) began as an chemical production facility operated by DuPont during the Second World War, with construction on the main facility starting in the summer of 1940. Originally producing
ammonia
Ammonia is an inorganic compound of nitrogen and hydrogen with the formula . A stable binary hydride, and the simplest pnictogen hydride, ammonia is a colourless gas with a distinct pungent smell. Biologically, it is a common nitrogenous was ...
for use in the manufacture of explosives, the MOW also produced alcohol,
hexamine
Hexamethylenetetramine, also known as methenamine, hexamine, or urotropin, is a heterocyclic organic compound with the formula (CH2)6N4. This white crystalline compound is highly soluble in water and polar organic solvents. It has a cage-like s ...
, and
formaldehyde
Formaldehyde ( , ) (systematic name methanal) is a naturally occurring organic compound with the formula and structure . The pure compound is a pungent, colourless gas that polymerises spontaneously into paraformaldehyde (refer to section F ...
before being expanded to produce heavy water for use in the P-9 Project. Works at Morgantown were undertaken by DuPont under a
cost-plus fixed fee contract, as was the works at Wabash and Alabama. Construction commenced on 7 January 1943, and was substantially completed ahead of the 1 September scheduled date. The facilities were progressively brought into operation between 29 May and 28 August 1943. The cost was $3,490,069. DuPont's fixed fee was originally $154,882, but this was voluntarily reduced to $88,588 because the cost of construction was considerably less than the $6,034,000 originally estimated.
The electrolytic finishing plant was established at Morgantown because that plant was under the control of DuPont's Ammonia Division. At this plant the output from the distillation plants, which was about 90% heavy water, was broken down by electrolysis into hydrogen and oxygen. The light hydrogen tends to be drawn off first, leaving the heavy water behind. This process was repeated through several stages to yield a finished product that was 99.75% heavy water. After the water reached a concentration of 99.75%, the heavy water was then transported by rail to the
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the b ...
where it was used as a potential moderator for the first nuclear reactors constructed in the United States.
Following the end of the war, DuPont ended their operations at the MOW and the site was leased to various chemical companies until the early 1950s before standing vacant until 1962 when the area was purchased from the United States General Services Administration for the price of $1.25 million by the Morgantown Community Association. The property was then conveyed to the newly created Morgantown Ordnance Works, Inc., owned by local industrialist J.W. Ruby, who began converting the site into an industrial park. In 1984, part of the site was formally proposed to be added to the
Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Superfund National Priorities List and was added to the list two years later in 1986. Remedy construction began in 2001 and included the consolidation of contaminated materials into an on-site landfill which was covered with a multi-layer cap. The remedy also included long-term monitoring and institutional controls and was completed in 2003. On 21 August 2018, the EPA removed the Ordnance Works Disposal Areas from the Superfund National Priorities List along with eight other sites.
Wabash
Construction commenced on 23 January 1943, and was substantially completed on 22 October. Stages of the P-9 distillation plant became operational between 17 June and 18 September 1943. Total cost was $7,493,157, including DuPont's fee of $152,472, which was voluntarily reduced from $272,776 because the plant was constructed for substantially less than the allocated $13,665,000.
Alabama
Construction commenced on 11 February 1943, and was completed on 15 November. Stages of the P-9 distillation plant became operational between 29 May and 4 September 1943. Total cost was $3,466,171, including DuPont's fee of $70,368, which was voluntarily reduced from $184,680 because the plant was constructed for substantially less than the allocated $8,285,000.
Production
![Argonne history Chicago Pile-3](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3f/Argonne_history_Chicago_Pile-3.jpg)
The three American plants never achieved the intended production of per month. A series of suggestions for improving production was considered, and the most promising were carried out. The most successful of these was the reconstruction of the first stage towers at Morgantown to reduce leakage, which resulted in a considerable improvement in performance. However, by this time, early 1945, it was decided that production was sufficient, and the expense of doing this at the other plants could not be justified.
The P-9 distillation plant at Alabama was closed in June 1945, that at Wabash in July, and the one at Morgantown in August. The electrolytic finishing plant at Morgantown was closed in September. Intermediate product remaining when the plants were closed was sent to Trail. This resulted in approximately of extra production at Trail. Between February 1944 and August 1945, the electrolytic finishing plant at Morgantown, which finished the product for all three plants, produced an average of per month, for a total of .
The electrolytic finishing plant also processed from heavy water recovered from Germany by the Manhattan Project's
Alsos Mission
The Alsos Mission was an organized effort by a team of British and United States military, scientific, and intelligence personnel to discover enemy scientific developments during World War II. Its chief focus was on the German nuclear energy pro ...
. The average monthly production cost was $72,000 for Morgantown, $154,000 at Alabama and $197,400 at Wabash, for a total of $423,400. Thus, heavy water cost $186 per pound, excluding the $11,967,000 cost of the plants. If this is included, it cost $550 per pound, compared to $111 per pound at Trail.
Intermediate product was shipped from Wabash and Alabama by rail in sealed metal containers. The finished product was shipped by rail from Morgantown via the
Monongahela Railway
The Monongahela Railway was a coal-hauling short line railroad in Pennsylvania and West Virginia in the United States. It was jointly controlled originally by the Pennsylvania Railroad, New York Central subsidiary Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Rail ...
and Trail via the
Canadian Pacific Railway
The Canadian Pacific Railway (french: Chemin de fer Canadien Pacifique) , also known simply as CPR or Canadian Pacific and formerly as CP Rail (1968–1996), is a Canadian Class I railway incorporated in 1881. The railway is owned by Canadi ...
to the Manhattan Project's
Metallurgical Laboratory
The Metallurgical Laboratory (or Met Lab) was a scientific laboratory at the University of Chicago that was established in February 1942 to study and use the newly discovered chemical element plutonium. It researched plutonium's chemistry and m ...
at the
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the b ...
. Heavy water from Trail was used for
Chicago Pile 3
Chicago Pile-3 (CP-3) was the world's first heavy water reactor. One of the first research reactors, it was built in 1943 near Palos Hills, Illinois, original site of Argonne National Laboratory. Joining CP-1/CP-2, it first went critical on 15 ...
at
Argonne, the first reactor using heavy water and natural uranium. Designed by
Eugene Wigner
Eugene Paul "E. P." Wigner ( hu, Wigner Jenő Pál, ; November 17, 1902 – January 1, 1995) was a Hungarian-American theoretical physicist who also contributed to mathematical physics. He received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1963 "for his con ...
and built under the direction of
Walter Zinn
Walter Henry Zinn (December 10, 1906 – February 14, 2000) was an American nuclear physicist who was the first director of the Argonne National Laboratory from 1946 to 1956. He worked at the Manhattan Project's Metallurgical Laboratory during W ...
, it went critical on 15 May 1944. An allocation of heavy water was used by the
Chalk River Laboratories
Chalk River Laboratories (french: Laboratoires de Chalk River; also known as CRL, Chalk River Labs and formerly Chalk River Nuclear Laboratories, CRNL) is a Canadian nuclear research facility in Deep River, about north-west of Ottawa.
CRL is a ...
to build
ZEEP
The ZEEP (Zero Energy Experimental Pile) reactor was a nuclear reactor built at the Chalk River Laboratories near Chalk River, Ontario, Canada (which superseded the Montreal Laboratory for nuclear research in Canada). ZEEP first went critical a ...
under Kowarski's direction, which went critical in September 1945. This was followed by its
NRX
NRX (National Research Experimental) was a heavy-water-moderated, light-water-cooled, nuclear research reactor at the Canadian Chalk River Laboratories, which came into operation in 1947 at a design power rating of 10 MW (thermal), increasing to ...
reactor in 1947, which was also moderated by heavy water. Like CP-3 and ZEEP it was used for scientific research, and not for plutonium production.
Demand for heavy water increased in the early 1950s. The heavy water facility at Wabash, now renamed the Dana Plant by the Atomic Energy Commission, was reopened, and DuPont resumed production of heavy water in May 1952.
The site was used a pilot plant for a new production process using
hydrogen sulphide
Hydrogen sulfide is a chemical compound with the formula . It is a colorless chalcogen-hydride gas, and is poisonous, corrosive, and flammable, with trace amounts in ambient atmosphere having a characteristic foul odor of rotten eggs. The unde ...
. The heavy water facility was closed again in early 1957. The facility, and a larger complex at the
Savannah River Site
The Savannah River Site (SRS) is a U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) reservation in the United States in the state of South Carolina, located on land in Aiken, Allendale, and Barnwell counties adjacent to the Savannah River, southeast of August ...
had fulfilled its purpose, supplying heavy water for the plutonium production reactors at Savannah River.
Notes
References
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{{Portal bar, World War II, Nuclear technology
History of the Manhattan Project
Isotope separation facilities of the Manhattan Project
DuPont
Teck Resources