224 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1951 



active materials needed could be produced at a very small fraction 

 of the cost by means of cyclotrons and other tools of nuclear physics ; 

 and their use in research was widespread and growing long before 

 they were made available from atomic-energy reactors. Probably 

 scientists were apt to stress the importance of these substances be- 

 cause their consciences were uneasy after Hiroshima and Nagasaki, 

 and they welcomed an aspect of atomic energy, the humane and intel- 

 lectual implications of which would offset some of the horrors of 

 atomic warfare. Official releases of information used the facts about 

 them because they were nonsecret and made a good story. These ma- 

 terials, which were available more than 10 years before the realization 

 of the release of atomic energy, cannot justify the development of 

 the atomic bomb or the colossal sums spent on atomic energy. Justi- 

 fication must, and I believe will, come from applications of atomic 

 energy of immensely greater economic and industrial significance. 



INDUSTRIAL POWER 



The most obvious and the most important application of atomic 

 energy that we can envisage at the moment is the production of in- 

 dustrial power. The tactical or strategic applications of atomic 

 energy in warfare, some of which have received attention in the press, 

 form no part of this lecture, for they are anything but economic and 

 represent merely a diversion of effort from development of greater 

 and more permanent human value. Accordingly, I shall not discuss 

 such special problems as the use of atomic energy for the propulsion 

 of submarines or for the acceleration away from the earth of the 

 so-called "space ships" with which some enthusiasts propose to develop 

 luxury holiday traffic between the planets. I propose to confine my- 

 self to the possibility of generating, in large fixed reactors, industrial 

 power which is distributed as electrical energy. 



I want to emphasize that the users of industrial power in factory, 

 office, or home, will notice no difference whatever from their present 

 use of electricity derived from water power or coal. Atomic-energy 

 reactors will merely replace the furnaces of power stations burning 

 coal. The most noticeable difference at the generating station will 

 be the absence of coal dumps, coal-handling equipment, coal wagons 

 or barges, ash-disposal systems, and smoking chimneys. The boilers 

 and steam turbines, the electric generators and other equipment will 

 remain, though the boilers and turbines might later be replaced by 

 heat exchangers and gas turbines. Thus the successful application 

 of atomic energy will pass almost unnoticed by most people except 

 that there may be fewer interruptions of supply; restrictions on the 

 use of electricity may be replaced by a positive urge to use it, and 

 electric clocks will really tell the time. 



