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Mountain West News Bureau

A regional collaboration of public media stations that serve the Rocky Mountain States of Colorado, Idaho, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming.

Idaho experiment that showed nuclear power was more than a weapon turns 70 years old

Boise State Public Radio News | By Madelyn Beck

Published December 20, 2021 at 11:54 AM MST

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Nuclear physicists Walter Zinn (right) and Harold Lichtenberger (left) in front of the lightbulbs they lit up with nuclear energy for the first time with EBR-1.

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The site of EBR-1, the world's first nuclear power plant, is now a museum. While there have been limited tours over the last few years, the facility still houses countless artifacts from the first tests to create electricity from nuclear power. Of note, anything radioactive has long been cleared out of the building.

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Inside the building that housed EBR-1 and its museum.

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Replicas of the four lightbulbs lit by EBR-1 70 years ago.

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Original lightbulbs from early nuclear energy experiments.

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The concrete "hot cell" at the EBR-1 facility has 33 panes of leaded glass measuring at about 3.5 feet thick. People on the outside could use mechanical arms to examine spent nuclear fuel rods on the inside. Here, Ryan Weeks demonstrates how light in each pane catches on his phone's flashlight. Mineral oils that make the glass clear are gradually draining from the panes, resulting in the opaque portion at the top.

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The control room at the EBR-1 facility isn't functional anymore and, before COVID-19, high school groups could come through and push the buttons and pull the levers.

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You're looking down into the vessel that would have contained EBR-1's nuclear reactor.

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Lyndon B. Johnson holds one of the original 4 lightbulbs from the EBR-1 experiment showing that nuclear power could produce more electricity than it consumed. He's standing with Glenn T. Seaborg, then the chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, in 1966. Johnson was the only sitting president to ever visit this location, and was given one of these original lightbulbs, which is now at the former president's museum in Texas.

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Eastern Idaho is home to the EBR-1 facility because researchers felt it was far enough away from urban centers (in case something went wrong) and it was a large area that had already been used by the Navy for testing battleship guns. The Navy is often cited as the reason that we pursued the kind of nuclear reactors we see today. That is, this kind of nuclear energy worked well on naval vessels.

The nation’s nuclear power industry was born here in the Mountain West, and Monday marks the 70th anniversary of a facility producing enough power to light up four light bulbs – and showing that nuclear power could be used for more than just weapons.

Now, as the nation explores new kinds of nuclear power to reduce carbon emissions, Mountain West News Bureau reporter Madelyn Beck visited EBR-1 (or Experimental Breeder Reactor No. 1) in Idaho, about 160 miles from Yellowstone National Park.

She walked from room to room with Idaho National Labs’ Ryan Weeks, who spoke about the plant’s history.

This story was produced by the Mountain West News Bureau, a collaboration between Nevada Public Radio, Wyoming Public Media, Boise State Public Radio in Idaho, KUNR in Nevada, the O'Connor Center for the Rocky Mountain West in Montana, KUNC in Colorado, KUNM in New Mexico, with support from affiliate stations across the region. Funding for the Mountain West News Bureau is provided in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.