Heavy Water

[atticus]

Hey, I seen the "Today in Military History" on the front page and it says that the Norweigan resistance deystroyed a tanker full of heavy water, and I searched heavy water and I couldn't find out what the heck it is. All I know is something about it being 10% heavier, but is it also some sort of weapon?

 

[Quiet Riot]

It can be used as a moderator in a nuclear reactor, it's also used in the production of weapon grade plutonimum(which is what the shippement was probably going to be used for.)

 

[Franko]

That event happened during WW2 when the Reich was trying to develope their own nuke 

Thankfully they never succeded.

Regards

 

[Gunner]

http://ca.search.yahoo.com/search?fr=slv1-&p=heavy+water

 

[George Wallace]

If you do a lot of travelling, you will notice the difference in the water.  Some places have very soft water, others have hard water, happening naturally.  Where I have noticed it most is the difference in the way my soap and shampoo react in different types of water around the country and world.  Sometimes it will form a film that seems to take forever to rinse off in soft water, and then rinses off easily in harder water.

GW

 

[Gunnerlove]

Wether water is soft or hard is based on mineral content.

Heavy water is neither it is infact atomically modified.

 

[George Wallace]

Just confusing my waters....

GW

 

[Redeye]

Hey, I seen the "Today in Military History" on the front page and it says that the Norweigan resistance deystroyed a tanker full of heavy water, and I searched heavy water and I couldn't find out what the heck it is. All I know is something about it being 10% heavier, but is it also some sort of weapon?

Heavy water is water that has been repeatedly distilled to increase its content of deuterium, which is an isotope of hydrogen.  Most hydrogen is simply a proton and an electron.  Add a neutron, you get deuterium.  Add another one, you get tritium.  Heavy water is used as a moderator in certain types of nuclear reactors (like CANDU reactors).  It sucks up some of the fission-causing neutrons, keeping the reaction from getting out of control.

 

[atticus]

So if its sucking up fission-causing neutrons does that mean that its keeping the reactor from getting over heated? (I understand that heat is best held in water, explaining why cities around the great lakes would be much warmer during winter than cities in the praries)

 

[Dogboy]

your sort of right

Heavy water is used as a control around a reaction and the heat in it is exchanged with normal watter and that is used to run turbines. heavy watter is never dumped back into the natural sistom. it is held under presher in the reactor core.

the heat around the big southern city's is not from the nukes its from the by-protik of moderan living (cars heated homes and the such)
tho every power plant releases warm water (their's a lake by Edmonton that never freezes over because of the power plants around it)
the nuclear power plants should not be releasing radioactive watter (should)
also radioactive HOT is not like temp.hot its a different form of energy.

 

[big bad john]

Spell check please.

 

[Pieman]

Just to be more formal in defining heavy water, lets see what the say SNOmen about this stuff, they got lots of heavy water in the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory.

Heavy water is chemically the same as regular (light) water, but with the two hydrogen atoms (as in H2O) replaced with deuterium atoms (hence the symbol D2O). Deuterium is an isotope of hydrogen; it has one extra neutron. Thus the deutrium atom consists of one proton and one neutron in the atomic nucleus and one orbiting electron. It is the extra neutron that makes heavy water "heavy", about 10% heavier in fact.

http://www.sno.phy.queensu.ca/sno/D2O.html


The following webpage lists the advantages and disadvantages of using various collants in Nuclear reactors. One of the main advantages of using heavy water is it has a short lived radioactivity, as Redeye mentioned.
http://www.nuc.berkeley.edu/thyd/ne161/rahmed/coolants.html

 

[Thirstyson]

Keep in mind that there's noting really dangerous about heavy water. It's just a bit heavier, it's NOT radioactive. It is useful for reactors, hence the WWII incident, and it's very very expensive.

 

[Stirling N6123]

Heavy water is in fact radioactive. It's term in the Nuke industry is called Tritium D2O, it is used to slow down the acceleration of atoms at the time of fission. Other moderators are graphite, beryllium, even regular water. Heavy water has a half life of 12.5 years.

Ask anybody that works at either Pickering A or B or Darlington, Why do you Pee in the bottle after every trip into the boiler-room, calandria or vacuum building? And why if you go nowhere near the reactor, why do you pee in a bottle once a week before going home?

Your body treats heavy water like regular water, it is absorbed into your body through breathing, your hands and your skin. It takes alot to kill you, lots and lots, but constant exposure over a career of say 30 years, you might wanna track high doses of the stuff.

Cheers.

 

[Thirstyson]

Yes, tritium is radioactive... but normally heavy water contains only deuterium.  If it's been in a reactor for 10 years then, yes, it's radioactive as it contains lots of tritium. Pretty much anything that spends 10 years inside a reactor will be radioactive

 

[Pretorian]

alot to kill you, lots and lots, but constant exposure over a career of say 30 years, you might wanna track high doses of the stuff.

Thats good advise, thats are difference between Acute Exposure (an Large unplanned) and Chronic Exposure ( careers worth) of exposure to radiation. Tritium is measured by MPCa (maximum permsissable concentrations in air) The dose commitment for tritium is measured through a bioassay (peeing in a cup) and is assigned as absorbed Whole Body Dose to exposed workers. Proper selection of radiological personal protective equipment will assist in keeping the absorbed whole body dose to a minimum.

 

[Thirstyson]

I'm just trying to make clear that heavy water is nothing to be afraid of. It's safe, if it's been in a reactor for 10 years, it's not heavy water, it's nuclear waste.

 

[Redeye]

Heavy water is in fact radioactive. It's term in the Nuke industry is called Tritium D2O, it is used to slow down the acceleration of atoms at the time of fission. Other moderators are graphite, beryllium, even regular water. Heavy water has a half life of 12.5 years.

Ask anybody that works at either Pickering A or B or Darlington, Why do you Pee in the bottle after every trip into the boiler-room, calandria or vacuum building? And why if you go nowhere near the reactor, why do you pee in a bottle once a week before going home?

Your body treats heavy water like regular water, it is absorbed into your body through breathing, your hands and your skin. It takes alot to kill you, lots and lots, but constant exposure over a career of say 30 years, you might wanna track high doses of the stuff.

Cheers.

Heavy water that has not been introduced into a reactor is not radioactive, it becomes contaminated with tritium once inside the reactor, and then it's radioactive.