Timeline of nuclear energy

From Timelines
Revision as of 14:36, 14 December 2017 by Sebastian (talk | contribs)
Jump to: navigation, search

This is a timeline of nuclear energy.

Sample questions

The following are some interesting questions that can be answered by reading this timeline:

Big picture

Time period Development summary
1895–1945 The science of atomic radiation, atomic change and nuclear fission is developed in this period, much of it in the last six of those years, in which most development is focused on the atomic bomb.[1]
1945–1950s After the end of World War II attention is given to harnessing nuclear energy in a controlled fashion for naval propulsion and for making electricity. In the 1950s, nuclear power is first used for electricity generation. Since 1956, the prime focus is put on the technological evolution of reliable nuclear power plants.[2][3]
1960–late 1970s The world’s nuclear capacity grows from 1 GW to over 100 GW, driven by the growth of electricity consumption and a political desire to move away from oil dependency following the oil crisis of the 1970s.[2] The nuclear power industry in the United States grows rapidly in the 1960s. Utility companies see this

new form of electricity production as economical, environmentally clean, and safe.[3]

1970s–2002 The nuclear power industry suffers some decline and stagnation.[1] In the mid–1970s public opinion grows more critical of nuclear power, with increasing fear of accidents and an uncertainty as to the handling of radioactive waste.[2]
1980s Chernobyl
1990s

Full timeline

Year Event type Details Country
1789 German chemist Martin Klaproth discovers uranium and names it after the planet Uranus.[1] Germany?
1895 German physicist Wilhelm Röntgen discovers X-rays.[1][4] Germany
1896 French phycisist Henry Bequerel becomes the first to discover evidence of radioactivity. The name of the phenomenon is given by Pierre and Marie Curie.[1][4] France
1898 Pierre and Marie Curie isolate polonium and radium from the pitchblende.[1] France
1898 Samuel Prescott shows that radiation destroys bacteria in food.[1]
1899 New Zealand-born British physicist Ernest Rutherford distinguishes alpha and beta radiation and discovers half–life.[4] United Kingdom
1900 French scientist Paul Ulrich Villard discovers gamma rays while studying the radiation emanating from radium.[1]
1902-1919 Ernest Rutherford shows that radioactivity as a spontaneous event emitting an alpha or beta particle from the nucleus creates a different element. Rutherford would go on to develop a fuller understanding of atoms and in 1919 he manages to fire alpha particles from a radium source into nitrogen and finds that nuclear rearrangement is occurring, with formation of oxygen.[1][3][4] United Kingdom
1905 Albert Einstein publishes paper putting forward the equivalence between mass and energy.[1] Germany
1911 English radiochemist Frederick Soddy discovers that naturally-radioactive elements have a number of different isotopes (radionuclides), with the same chemistry. In the same year, Hungarian radiochemist George de Hevesy shows that such radionuclides are invaluable as tracers, because minute amounts can readily be detected with simple instruments.[1] United Kingdom
1913 Bohr model of the atomic structure.
1920 Scientific development Ernest Rutherford theorizes a "neutron".[4]
1932 Scientific development English physicist James Chadwick discovers the neutron.[1][4] United Kingdom
1932 Scientific development Cockcroft and Walton produce nuclear transformations by bombarding atoms with accelerated protons.[1]
1934 Scientific development Irene Curie and Frederic Joliot find that some transformations like those created by Cockcroft and Walton create artificial radionuclides, thus discovering artificial radioactivity.[1] France
1935 Scientific development Italian-American physicist Enrico Fermi finds that a much greater variety of artificial radionuclides could be formed when neutrons are used instead of protons.[1] Italy
1938 Scientific development German chemists Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann in Berlin show that the new lighter elements are barium and others which are about half the mass of uranium, thereby demonstrating that nuclear fission has occurred.[1][3] Germany
1939 Scientific development Otto Hahn and Austrian-Swedish physicist Lise Meitner, along with a small group of scientists, publish results of their discovery of nuclear fission of uranium when it absorbes an extra neutron.[5][6]
1939 Scientific development Frederic Curie confirmed a theory put forth by Leo Szilard. World War II begins.
1942 Scientific development Enrico Fermi and Hungarian-born American physicist Leo Szilard measure neutron multiplication, concluding that a nuclear chain reaction is possible. That year, the couple creates the Chicago Pile-1, Chicago University.[4] United States
1942 (December 2) Scientific development Manhattan Project: The world's first nuclear chain reaction takes place in Chicago.[7][3] United States
1945 (July 16) Manhattan Project: The United States stages first test of a plutonium weapon, code-named “Trinity”, before dawn in the Jornada del Muerto desert in New Mexico.[7][3] United States
1945 (August 6–9) Manhattan Project: American bomber drops atomic bomb on Japanese city of Hiroshima. Three days later, the Americans drop the second nuclear attack on Nagasaki. These are the first and last time nuclear energy is used as a weapon.[7][3] Japan
1942-1945 Manhattan Project: The Manhattan Project builds the worlds first Atomic Bomb.
1946 The United States Congress creates the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC).[3] United States
1947 The Atomic Energy Commission first investigates the possibility of peaceful uses of atomic energy.[3] United States
1949 The Soviet Union gets the atomic bomb.
1951 Experimental Breeder Reactor I starts up in Idaho and produces the world’s first useable electric power from nuclear energy, illuminating four light bulbs.[7] United States
1952 first Hydrogen bomb.
1954 The Soviet Union opens the 5 MW Obninsk Nuclear Power Plant, the first nuclear power plant to produce electricity for a power grid.[7] Russia
1955 The USS Nautilus (SSN-571) launches as the first nuclear-powered submarine.[4] United States
1955 (August 8–20) The first United Nations International Conference on the Peaceful Uses of Atomic Energy is hosted in Geneva.[3] Switzerland
1956 Calder Hall opens in Sellafield, England. It is the first commercial nuclear power station for civil use.[2][7] United Kingdom
1956 Marcoule Nuclear Site is commissioned by the French nuclear program, generating its first electricity.[7] France
1957 The United States completes its first first large-scale nuclear power plant in Shippingport, Pennsylvania.[7][3] United States
1959 The first nuclear plant built without government funding is completed in Dresden, Illinois. United States
1960 Yankee Rowe Nuclear Power Station starts operation in Rowe, Massachusetts, using the first fully commercial PWR of 250 MWe, designed by Westinghouse.[1] United States
1961 (November 22) The United States Navy commissions the world’s largest ship, the USS Enterprise (CVN-65), a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier with the ability to operate at speeds upto 30 knots for distances up to 740,800 kilometers without refueling.[3] United States
1964 The first two Soviet nuclear power plants are commissioned.[1] Soviet Union
1965 The US launches the first nuclear reactor in space.
1970 (March 5) Treaty The United States, United Kingdom, Soviet Union, and 45 other nations ratify the Treaty for Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.[3]
1972 The world's first commercial prototype fast neutron reactor (the BN-350) started up in Kazakhstan, producing 120 MW of electricity and heat to desalinate Caspian seawater.[1] Soviet Union
1973 The first large RBMK (1,000 MW - high-power channel reactor) is commissioned at Sosnovy Bor, Leningrad Oblast.[1] Soviet Union
1974 France decides to make a major push for nuclear energy. This decision would end up with 75% of their electricity coming from nuclear reactors.[4] France
1974 Plant Atucha I Nuclear Power Plant becomes operational near Zárate, Buenos Aires. It's the first nuclear power plant in Latin America. Argentina
1979 (March 28) Accident The Three mile island accident is the worst accident in United States commercial reactor history. The accident is caused by a loss of coolant from the reactor core due to a combination of mechanical malfunction and human error. However, no one is injured, and no overexposure to radiation results from the accident.[2][7][3][4] United States
1983 Nuclear power generates more energy than natural gas.
1986 Accident The Chernobyl explosion occurs.
1987 Yucca Mountain is considered as a storage place for nuclear waste material produced in the US.
1990 Policy Italy has all of its four reactors closed down.[2]
1991 Statistics The United States have twice as many operating nuclear powerplants as any other country. At the end of the year, 31 other countries also have nuclear powerplants in commercial operation or under construction.[3]
1994 The Megatons to Megawatts Program is signed between the United States and Russia, to downblend nuclear warheads into reactor fuel. Eventually, 10% of US electricity would come from dismantled nuclear weapons.[4]
1996 Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), Japan’s biggest power utility, starts commercial operation of the world’s first advanced boiling water reactor (ABWR), commissioned at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Nuclear Power Plant.[7] Japan
2005 Finland approves construction of one of the world’s largest nuclear power plants, raising the dormant atomic power industry’s hopes for a revival.[7] Finland
2011 (March 11) Accident A 9.0 magnitude earthquake and tsunami wrecks the Fukushima nuclear plant, triggering nuclear meltdowns that contaminate food and water and force mass evacuations. Nearly 16,000 people are killed in the earthquake and the tsunami and 3,300 remain unaccounted for. However, much of the radiation released of it goes out to sea instead of into populated area. No people are expected to die from radiation dose.[7][4][4] Japan
2012 Japan shuts its last working nuclear power reactor following the nuclear disaster, leaving it without nuclear power for the first time since 1970.[7] Japan
2013 (March) Publication Famous climate scientist James Hansen co-publishes a paper from NASA computing that, even with worst case estimates of nuclear accidents, nuclear energy as a whole has saved 1.8 million lives and counting by offsetting the air-pollution related deaths that come from fossil fuel plants.
2013 (September) Space probe Voyager I enters interstellar space, 36 years after its launch. It is powered by a Plutonium-238 Radioisotope thermoelectric generator.[4]

Meta information on the timeline

How the timeline was built

The initial version of the timeline was written by User:Sebastian.

Funding information for this timeline is available.

What the timeline is still missing

[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7]

Timeline update strategy

See also

External links

References

  1. 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 1.12 1.13 1.14 1.15 1.16 1.17 1.18 1.19 "Outline History of Nuclear Energy". world-nuclear.org. Retrieved 9 December 2017. 
  2. 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 "History of nuclear power". corporate.vattenfall.com. Retrieved 9 December 2017. 
  3. 3.00 3.01 3.02 3.03 3.04 3.05 3.06 3.07 3.08 3.09 3.10 3.11 3.12 3.13 3.14 "The History Of Nuclear Energy" (PDF). energy.gov. Retrieved 14 December 2017. 
  4. 4.00 4.01 4.02 4.03 4.04 4.05 4.06 4.07 4.08 4.09 4.10 4.11 4.12 4.13 "History of Nuclear Energy". whatisnuclear.com. Retrieved 14 December 2017. 
  5. Meitner, L.; Frisch, O. R. (1939). "Disintegration of Uranium by Neutrons: A New Type of Nuclear Reaction". Nature. 143 (3615): 239. Bibcode:1939Natur.143..239M. doi:10.1038/143239a0. 
  6. Frisch, O. R. (1939). "Physical Evidence for the Division of Heavy Nuclei under Neutron Bombardment". Nature. 143 (3616): 276. Bibcode:1939Natur.143..276F. doi:10.1038/143276a0.  [The experiment for this letter to the editor was conducted on 13 January 1939; see Richard Rhodes The Making of the Atomic Bomb 263 and 268 (Simon and Schuster, 1986).]
  7. 7.00 7.01 7.02 7.03 7.04 7.05 7.06 7.07 7.08 7.09 7.10 7.11 7.12 "Nuclear Power History: Timeline From Inception To Fukushima". huffingtonpost.com. Retrieved 9 December 2017.