Peaceful nuclear explosion

Proposed uses include excavation for the building of canals and harbours, electrical generation, the use of nuclear explosions to drive spacecraft, and as a form of wide-area fracking.

One of the first U.S. proposals for peaceful nuclear explosions that came close to being carried out was Project Chariot, which would have used several hydrogen bombs to create an artificial harbor at Cape Thompson, Alaska.

For example, the Project Gasbuggy site,[8] located 89 kilometres (55 mi) east of Farmington, New Mexico, still contains nuclear contamination from a single subsurface blast in 1967.

[9] Other consequences included blighted land, relocated communities, tritium-contaminated water, radioactivity, and fallout from debris being hurled high into the atmosphere.

[13] Reports on the successful Soviet use of nuclear explosions in extinguishing out-of-control gas well fires were widely cited in United States policy discussions of options for stopping the 2010 Gulf of Mexico Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

In the early 1970s a feasibility study was conducted for a project to build a canal from the Mediterranean Sea to the Qattara Depression in the Western Desert of Egypt using nuclear demolition.

This project proposed to use 213 devices, with yields of 1 to 1.5 megatons, detonated at depths of 100 to 500 m (330 to 1,640 ft) to build this canal for the purpose of producing hydroelectric power.

The United States Atomic Energy Commission chairman announced that the Plowshare project was intended to "highlight the peaceful applications of nuclear explosive devices and thereby create a climate of world opinion that is more favorable to weapons development and tests".

[34][35] Other investigated uses for low-yield peaceful nuclear explosions were underground detonations to stimulate, by a process analogous to fracking, the flow of petroleum and natural gas in tight formations; this was developed most in the Soviet Union, with an increase in the production of many well heads being reported.

[36] Musk's specific plan would not be very feasible within the energy limitations of historically manufactured nuclear devices (ranging in kilotons of TNT-equivalent), therefore requiring major advancement for it to be considered.

In part due to these problems, the physicist Michio Kaku (who initially put forward the concept) instead suggests using nuclear reactors in the typical land-based district heating manner to make isolated tropical biomes on the Martian surface.

Impact would be a much more efficient scheme to deliver the required energy, water vapor, greenhouse gases, and other biologically significant volatiles that could begin to quickly terraform Mars.

The rapid capture of so many neutrons required in the synthesis of einsteinium would provide the needed direct experimental confirmation of the so-called r-process, the multiple neutron absorptions needed to explain the cosmic nucleosynthesis (production) of all chemical elements heavier than nickel on the periodic table in supernova explosions, before beta decay, with the r-process explaining the existence of many stable elements in the universe.

Data obtained from the August 1958 Project Argus test shots, a high-altitude nuclear explosion investigation, were vital to the early understanding of Earth's magnetosphere.

Sakharov suggested to replace the copper coil in his MK generators by a big superconductor solenoid to magnetically compress and focus underground nuclear explosions into a shaped charge effect.

[52][53][54] Project A119, proposed in the 1960s, which as Apollo scientist Gary Latham explained, would have been the detonating of a "smallish" nuclear device on the Moon in order to facilitate research into its geologic make-up.

[55] Analogous in concept to the comparatively low yield explosion created by the water prospecting (LCROSS) Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite mission, which launched in 2009 and released the "Centaur" kinetic energy impactor, an impactor with a mass of 2,305 kg (5,081 lb), and an impact velocity of about 9,000 km/h (5,600 mph),[56] releasing the kinetic energy equivalent of detonating approximately 2 tons of TNT (8.86 GJ).

[58] The ablation data collected for various materials and the distances the spheres were propelled, serve as the bedrock for the nuclear pulse propulsion study, Project Orion.

[59] In the 1970s Edward Teller, in the United States, popularized the concept of using a nuclear detonation to power an explosively pumped soft X-ray laser as a component of a ballistic missile defense shield known as Project Excalibur.

[64] A proposed means of averting an asteroid impacting with Earth, assuming short lead times between detection and Earth impact, is to detonate one, or a series, of nuclear explosive devices, on, in, or in a stand-off proximity orientation with the asteroid,[65] with the latter method occurring far enough away from the incoming threat to prevent the potential fracturing of the near-Earth object, but still close enough to generate a high thrust laser ablation effect.

[66] A 2007 NASA analysis of impact avoidance strategies using various technologies stated:[67] Nuclear stand-off explosions are assessed to be 10–100 times more effective than the non-nuclear alternatives analyzed in this study.

Other techniques involving the surface or subsurface use of nuclear explosives may be more efficient, but they run an increased risk of fracturing the target near-Earth object.

One of the Chariot schemes involved chaining five thermonuclear devices to create the artificial harbor.
The 1962 Sedan nuclear test formed a crater 100 m (330 ft) deep with a diameter of about 390 m (1,300 ft) as a means of investigating the possibilities of using peaceful nuclear explosions for large-scale earth moving. If this test was conducted in 1965, when improvements in device design were realized, a 100-fold reduction in radiation release was considered feasible. [ 21 ] The 140 kt Soviet Chagan (nuclear test) , comparable in yield to the Sedan test of 104 kt, formed Lake Chagan , reportedly used as a watering hole for cattle and human swimming. [ 22 ] [ 23 ] [ 24 ]
Map of all proposed routes for a tunnel and/or canal route from the Mediterranean Sea to the Qattara Depression .
No route was shorter than 55 kilometers in length. Canal-cutting investigations began with the buggy salvo shot of Operation Crosstie in 1967.
Comet "Siding Spring" made a close approach to the planet Mars in October 2014.
The element einsteinium was first discovered, in minute quantities, following the analysis of the fallout from the first thermonuclear atmospheric test. [ 39 ]
An artist's conception of the NASA reference design for the Project Orion spacecraft powered by nuclear pulse propulsion
A nuclear shaped charge design that was to provide nuclear pulse propulsion to the Project Orion vehicle
The bright spikes extending below the initial fireball of one of 1952's Operation Tumbler–Snapper test shots are known as the " rope trick effect ". They are caused by the intense flash of X-rays released by the explosion heating the tower holding guy-wires white hot. Project Excalibur intended to focus these X-rays to allow attacks over long distances.
Artist's impression of the impact event that resulted in the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event , which resulted in the extinction of the non-avian dinosaurs some 65 million years ago. A natural impact with an explosive yield of 100 teratons of TNT (4.2 × 10 23 J ). [ 61 ] The most powerful man-made explosion, the Tsar Bomba , by comparison had a yield almost 2 million times smaller – 57 megatons of TNT (2.4 × 10 17 J ). [ 62 ] The 1994 Comet Shoemaker–Levy 9 impacts on planet Jupiter , the Tunguska and Chelyabinsk asteroid–Earth collisions of 1908 and 2013 respectively, have served as an impetus for the analysis of technologies that could prevent the destruction of human life by impact events.