Nuclear power is needed for the H bomb

Watts Bar 1_NRC

TVA’s not so hidden agenda for supporting nuclear power for climate

The Associated Press chose Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) President and CEO, Jeff Lash to express — “simply” — the view that “You can’t significantly reduce carbon emissions without nuclear power,” in its story proclaiming that almost two thirds of US states will choose nuclear power to address the climate crisis. But what the AP neglected to tell us was WHY TVA is so eager to keep nuclear power going.

Unique among commercial U.S. nuclear power plant owners, TVA, a federally owned electric utility corporation, through its two Watts Bar “civil” reactors (pictured), produces tritium (radioactive hydrogen) for the U.S. nuclear weapons complex, putting the “H” in hydrogen bomb.

As we wrote this week on Beyond Nuclear International, “The three TVA plants are at Browns Ferry in Alabama, and Sequoyah and Watts Bar, both in Tennessee. The two Watts Bar reactors produce tritium for the nuclear weapons sector — a clear crossing of the supposedly inviolable line between the civilian and military nuclear sectors.”

Furthermore,”TVA is also, right now, pushing federal regulators to allow it to increase its output of tritium, an essential radioisotope used in thermonuclear warheads to boost the explosive power of an atomic bomb. ” More

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