Graphite Moderated Reactor - History

History

The first nuclear reactor, Chicago Pile-1, a graphite-moderated device that produced a microscopic amount of heat, was constructed by a team led by Enrico Fermi in 1942. The construction and testing of this reactor (an "atomic pile") was part of the Manhattan Project. This work led to the construction of the X-10 Graphite Reactor at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, which was the first nuclear reactor designed and built for continuous operation, and began operation in 1943.

The nuclear reactor in the Chernobyl disaster was an RBMK graphite-moderated reactor. The reactor that led to the Windscale fire disaster was also a graphite moderated reactor.

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