Site acts as reactor architect

Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory

Web posted Monday, November 20, 2000

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By Brandon Haddock
Staff Writer

The birthplace of U.S. nuclear power is an 890-square-mile expanse of land in Idaho.

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For years, Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory has served as the nation's foremost developer of new nuclear reactor designs. The lab has developed numerous types of reactors for peaceful and military purposes.

Like many nuclear weapons sites, the Idaho lab originated as a conventional weapons facility during World War II. During the war, the Navy used a 270-square-mile area as a gunnery range, according to an official lab history.

The site became part of the burgeoning nuclear weapons complex in 1950, when the Atomic Energy Commission - the precursor of today's U.S. Department of Energy - claimed the range and renamed it the National Reactor Testing Station.

For decades since, the lab has fulfilled its role as an architect of new, improved nuclear reactors. Over the years, 52 reactors were built at the site, including:

Experimental Breeder Reactor I, the first reactor built at the lab and the first one in the world to generate electricity. The reactor, now a National Historic Landmark, also proved the concept of a ``breeder'' reactor - a reactor that creates more fuel than it uses.

Boiling Water Reactor Experiment III, which in 1955 provided electricity to Arco, Idaho, becoming the first reactor to light a U.S. town.

Numerous naval nuclear reactors, including the prototype reactor for the Nautilus nuclear submarine.

The lab also plays a role in the storage of nuclear waste and materials. Its Idaho Nuclear Technology and Engineering Center serves as a temporary storage site for some spent nuclear-reactor fuels from government projects, and the site stores some radioactive waste generated by its own work and by projects at other Energy Department sites.

Today, the lab employs about 8,000 people at eight major facilities. The site is operated by Bechtel BWXT Idaho LLC, a partnership between industry players Bechtel and BWX Technologies.

Reach Brandon Haddock at (706) 823-3409.

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