MOATA was a 100 kW thermal

Argonaut class reactor The Argonaut class reactor is a design of small nuclear research reactor. Many have been built throughout the world, over a wide range of power levels. Its functions are to teach nuclear reactor theory, nuclear physics and for use in engineering lab ...

built at the Australian Atomic Energy Commission (later

ANSTO The Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) is a statutory body of the Australian government, formed in 1987 to replace the Australian Atomic Energy Commission. Its head office and main facilities are in southern outs ...

) Research Establishment at Lucas Heights, Sydney. MOATA went

critical Critical or Critically may refer to: *Critical, or critical but stable, medical states **Critical, or intensive care medicine *Critical juncture, a discontinuous change studied in the social sciences. *Critical Software, a company specializing in ...

at 5:50am on 10 April 1961 and ended operations on 31 May 1995. MOATA was the first reactor to be decommissioned in Australia in 2009.

Background

The design of university training reactor MOATA was based on the Argonaut research reactor developed by the

Argonne National Laboratory Argonne National Laboratory is a science and engineering research United States Department of Energy National Labs, national laboratory operated by University of Chicago, UChicago Argonne LLC for the United States Department of Energy. The facil ...

in the mid-1950s, in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. Moata is an Aboriginal name meaning "gentle-fire" or "fire-stick". MOATA was designed and built by the Advanced Technology Laboratories and first went critical on 10 April 1961. The purpose of the reactor was for training scientists, however in the mid-1970s it was expanded to include activation analysis and

neutron radiography Neutron imaging is the process of making an image with neutrons. The resulting image is based on the neutron attenuation properties of the imaged object. The resulting images have much in common with industrial X-ray images, but since the image i ...

. MOATA initially offered training in reactor control and neutron physics, later

neutron activation analysis Neutron activation analysis (NAA) is the nuclear process used for determining the concentrations of elements in many materials. NAA allows discrete sampling of elements as it disregards the chemical form of a sample, and focuses solely on atomic ...

, soil analysis and nuclear medicine research.

Decommissioning

The reactor was shut down in 1995 as it was no longer possible, after 34 years, to economically justify its continued operations. Experimental data on

nuclear fuel Nuclear fuel is material used in nuclear power stations to produce heat to power turbines. Heat is created when nuclear fuel undergoes nuclear fission. Most nuclear fuels contain heavy fissile actinide elements that are capable of undergoing ...

and moderator systems was also accumulated during the operation of the reactor. With the dismantling of the reactor complete in 2009, the site has been completely restored. It was the first reactor to be decommissioned in Australia. In 1995 the used fuel from the reactor was unloaded and in 2006, it was shipped to the United States under the US DoE Foreign Research Reactor Spent Nuclear Fuel Acceptance.

References

Argonaut class reactor Science and technology in New South Wales Defunct nuclear reactors {{Australia-struct-stub