Legalities of Radioactive Elements

[SystemParanoia]

is it legal to own / or produce radioactive materials ?

say for instance, if you wanted to refine Americum 241 into fissile uranium so you could have your very own reactor in your garden / cellar.


would you need to get a licence off the council?

[ewenm]

I suspect the MoD would want to have a word...

[ninja-lewis]

The Radioactive Boy Scout

[SystemParanoia]

hmm, just realised, that refining the 241 wouldent be nessicary if you can get 60kg of the stuff, as thats is what you would need to obtain critical mass.

seeing as americum 241 is in every smoke detector ever made.. would this be ok... as everyone has it already

Edited by SystemParanoia on Wednesday 10th March 11:40

[ewenm]

There was a news report about some pseudo-terrorist who bought loads of smoke detectors to get the radioactive material. Feel free to give it a go though

[DaveL485]

It'd depend on the quantity, I suppose. Many things in the home are radioactive, but in minute quantities......however if you started building a mini chernobyl in the back yard environmental health would probably have a few things to say....

[Justayellowbadge]

ewenm said:

There was a news report about some pseudo-terrorist who bought loads of smoke detectors to get the radioactive material. Feel free to give it a go though

When you say 'news report' I think you mean 'fiction'.

Can't remember which, but that was a plot device in Spooks/24/something.

[Salgar]

SystemParanoia said:

is it legal to own / or produce radioactive materials ?

say for instance, if you wanted to refine Americum 241 into fissile uranium so you could have your very own reactor in your garden / cellar.


would you need to get a licence off the council?

Just don't let kids near your yellow cakes.

[SystemParanoia]

how much radioactive material are you allowed to own ?

building a reactor would be an awesome project... never having another electricity bill ever again!

nuclear reactors normally power steam turbines dont they ? a steam engine instead would also work wouldent it?


that boy scout link is cool

[ewenm]

Justayellowbadge said:

ewenm said:

There was a news report about some pseudo-terrorist who bought loads of smoke detectors to get the radioactive material. Feel free to give it a go though

When you say 'news report' I think you mean 'fiction'.

Can't remember which, but that was a plot device in Spooks/24/something.

Fair enough. Reality and fiction are so often confused in my mind

[SystemParanoia]

looks like toshiba's had a go

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2007/12/toshibas-ho...

[Xenocide]

There was a story from a eastern block country where an abandoned hospital's xray machine (or some machine) was found and a scrap merchant took the nice heavy lump of lead from the end of it.

After cracking open the lump he found this cool glowing stuff and showed it to a few people.

Turns out it infected loads of stuff, killed a few people and really fked up a few others.

Powerful stuff!

I'll try and find the link

http://www.nytimes.com/1984/05/01/science/nuclear-...

I was wrong about eastern block. I might be confusing two stories though.

Edited by Xenocide on Wednesday 10th March 12:46

[Morningside]

Pre/post wartime luminous dials?

Mentions watches here. But aircraft dials were just as bad.
http://www.trusted-forwarder.org/elgin/help/lumino...


My father had some (toy) mice way back in the early 70s that glowed like hell - Sent his Geiger Counter off the scale!

[SystemParanoia]

Morningside said:

My father had some (toy) mice way back in the early 70s that glowed like hell - Sent his Geiger Counter off the scale!

"Never did us any harm!"

[iggletiggle]

Hmm this is interesting..

surely if you built an underground concrete safety wall for the reactor you could get away with it?

i mean would there be anything visable on thermal or similar with the reactor underground in almost a mini bunker?

[SystemParanoia]

the noisest thing would be the steam engine/turbine..

having that would give a plausable reason for having a cooling tower wouldent it ?

[tonyvid]

ninja-lewis said:

The Radioactive Boy Scout

There are some great bits on the home page of that site

[The Wookie]

Xenocide said:

There was a story from a eastern block country where an abandoned hospital's xray machine (or some machine) was found and a scrap merchant took the nice heavy lump of lead from the end of it.

After cracking open the lump he found this cool glowing stuff and showed it to a few people.

Turns out it infected loads of stuff, killed a few people and really fked up a few others.

Powerful stuff!

I'll try and find the link

http://www.nytimes.com/1984/05/01/science/nuclear-...

I was wrong about eastern block. I might be confusing two stories though.

Edited by Xenocide on Wednesday 10th March 12:46

I think this is the one you're thinking of

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goi%C3%A2nia_accident

[Dogwatch]

Planning app might be interesting - the great unwashed/rent-a-mob/eternal 'students' would be camping on the doorstep in no time.

[Mr Darcy]

Ask Iran. They did it for ages without anyone finding out

Actually, what if you set your home up as a new country, would you be considered a nuclear power? Would the yanks bomb the st out of your little back garden and would it be a declaration of war!