What Happened to Nuclear Power?
| Dates: | May 21, 2020 |
|---|---|
| Meets: | Thurs. 10 - 11:30 AM (MDT): Webex Webinar - Live |
| Cost: | $0.00 |
Online registration is not available at this time. Please contact our office for more information.
Support Person: Academic Technology and Outreach Phone: (406) 994-6550 Email: continuinged@montana.edu
- This talk will be held via the online Webex platform.
- On May 20th, you will receive a confirmation email with login information.
Gerald Geise, a 1959 MSU alumnus in chemical engineering with over 30 years of experience in the nuclear industry, will present "What Happened to Nuclear Power?"
In this presentation, Geise will discuss the history, current status and probable future of nuclear-powered electrical generating stations. In 1954, Lewis Strauss, the chairmen of the Atomic Energy Commission, predicted that electricity generated by nuclear power would quickly become so economical that “it would be too cheap to meter.” In 1958, the USS Nautilus, the world's first operational nuclear-powered submarine that was designed to stay underwater for up to 6 months, completed a submerged transit of the North Pole. In 1957, the first land-based nuclear power generating station, the Shippingport Atomic Power Station in Shippingport, Pa., became operational and ran successfully until 1982. From 1955 to 1985, hundreds of nuclear-powered generating stations were built all over the world.
However, Geise argues that democratic societies are now facing the beginning of the end of nuclear power generating stations. At the same time, Russia and China are becoming the major suppliers of nuclear-powered generating stations for those countries that still have an interest in building and operating nuclear generating stations.
| Fee: | $0.00 |
Gerald Geise
Gerald Geise is a chemical engineering graduate from Montana State University. He spent 25 years in the nuclear industry with General Electric and United Nuclear in increasingly responsible engineering and management positions. Those include being the operations manager for the Hanford, Washington nuclear reactors producing plutonium for nuclear weapons and president of a United Nuclear division that manufactured nuclear reactors for the U.S. Navy. He has an extensive public speaking background on the risks and benefits of nuclear power - and a 30-year hobby of making candles.