1. Nuclear Power Plants

2. What do nuclear power plants release? Energy! How do these power plants provide us with energy? Energy is collected from the nucleus of decaying radioactive elements

3. How powerful is the energy released from the nucleus of a decaying radioactive isotope? We can use the following equation E=mc 2 E= Energy m= mass c=speed of light (3.0 x 10 8 ) What happens when you square a number? **This means that a small amount of mass can produce an extremely large amount of energy**

4. Nuclear Fission Nuclear fission: when an atomic nucleus is split into two or more fragments When lots of atoms are split it causes a chain reaction If this occurs too quickly an explosion will occur (this is what happens when an atom bomb explodes). Nuclear power plants in the US are nuclear fission power plants

5. Nuclear Fusion Nuclear fusion: two or more nuclei combine to form a larger nucleus This releases a large amount of energy Produces energy in stars like our sun Produces 20 times more energy than nuclear fission This causes no radioactive products to be produced so we wouldn’t need to worry about nuclear disposal Hard to start the reaction because it needs a large initial input of energy in the form of heat

6. What are some benefits of nuclear power plants? Clean energy Can get a lot of energy from a small amount of mass Cost effective in the long run

7. What are some disadvantages to nuclear power plants? Expensive to build the power plants What do we do with the nuclear waste? Nuclear power plant accidents Can be used as a weapon