this post was submitted on 14 Jan 2024
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[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

Uranium is actually pretty common, refining out the right isotope is the complicated part. Heck there were a couple natural nuclear reactors in a place that generated power for a few million years.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_nuclear_fission_reactor

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

Isn't uranium that's pure enough naturally to cause a reaction on its own really rare? I'm referring to the Chicago Pile experiment. It was so simple that it could have been theoretically built thousands of years ago which is crazy to think about.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

Not really. Every single shovel full of dirt has trace amounts. It's just gathering enough into a pile. Like I said, nature did it on earth, before humans existed. It's weapons grade uranium that's really rare

[–] [email protected] -1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

You can't get a reaction when it's that trace though. It needs to be unusually pure to be able to stack a bunch of raw ore and get a reaction.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

Nature did get the reaction with no humans. I don't know what to tell you