Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

N. Korea's HEU Stocks May Exceed its Plutonium Stockpile in 3 Years
Arirang News ^ | 06/27/11

Posted on 06/27/2011 8:02:05 AM PDT by TigerLikesRooster

Updated : Jun 27, 2011

N. Korea's HEU Stocks May Exceed its Plutonium Stockpile in 3 Years

A nuclear expert in the United States projects North Korea will obtain over 40 kilograms of high enriched uranium in three years.

Olli Heinonen, former Deputy Director of the International Atomic Energy Agency posted on 38 North, a website devoted to North Korean issues that Pyongyang would be capable of producing 1.8 tons of low enriched uranium if all 2-thousand centrifuge machines at its enrichment facility in Yongbyon were operated at full capacity.

He said an additional 8-hundred centrifuges would be able to convert the low enriched uranium to 40 kilograms of high enriched uranium, which would be enough to make one or two new nuclear bombs.

Heinonen added that if North Korea was left on its own, its high enriched uranium stocks could exceed its current plutonium stockpile after three years. Pyeongyang is estimated to have between 25 to 40 kilograms of plutonium stocks.

JUN 27, 2011


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: nkorea; nuke; plutonium; uranium

1 posted on 06/27/2011 8:02:12 AM PDT by TigerLikesRooster
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: TigerLikesRooster; AmericanInTokyo; Steel Wolf; nuconvert; MizSterious; nw_arizona_granny; ...

P!


2 posted on 06/27/2011 8:03:15 AM PDT by TigerLikesRooster (The way to crush the bourgeois is to grind them between the millstones of taxation and inflation)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: TigerLikesRooster

I wonder if stuxnet can fix this problem?


3 posted on 06/27/2011 8:36:41 AM PDT by Mr. K (CAPSLOCK! -Unleash the fury! [Palin/Bachman 2012- unbeatable ticket])
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: TigerLikesRooster
This is most disturbing. The N Koreans are having trouble with their plutonium design of implosion fission bombs. Plutonium is easy to extract from spent fuel rods but it is a much more sophisticated technology to utilize as a atomic weapon.

Weapons grade uranium is much more difficult to produce but it is much simpler to fashion into a fission weapon, and it will go bang every time and not fissile.

4 posted on 06/27/2011 8:42:33 AM PDT by cpdiii (Deckhand, Roughneck, Geologist, Pilot, Pharmacist, Iconoclast: THE CONSTITUTION IS WORTH DYING FOR.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: cpdiii

They will set off uranium bomb, then NK authorities announce that the ‘brilliant’ success is credited to Kim Junior, who is in real need of some accomplishment to burnish his resume.


5 posted on 06/27/2011 8:54:07 AM PDT by TigerLikesRooster (The way to crush the bourgeois is to grind them between the millstones of taxation and inflation)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson