Atomic powerIn 1958, the first privately-owned thorium-uranium atomic reactor to supply power began construction at Buchanan, N.Y. The Consolidated Edison Company's Indian Point 1 nuclear generating station was the first designed to utillize uranium-235 supplemented with thorium-232. It was designed by the Babcock and Wilcox Co., and built at a cost of $100 million on the site of a former amusement park. Its pressurized water reactor produced 275,000 kW of power for part of the New York metropolitan area. The Indian Point 1 operating licence was dated 26 Mar 1962. It began generating power on 16 Sep 1962. It was shut down on 31 Oct 1974.because it lacked an emergency cooling system for the reactor core.«[Image: Indian Point Unit 1 reactor at centre of picture, with one of the other two Indian Point reactors behind it.] |
