page_title: Atomic Age
section_title: 1970 to 2000
hierarchical_section_title: Atomic Age / 1970 to 2000
caption_attribution_description: English: View of Chernobyl power plant taken from the roof of a residential building in Pripyat, Ukraine. Photo Taken by Jason Minshull. العربية: وبالنظر الى تشيرنوبيل ماخوذه من سطح المبنى في بريبيات ، اوكرانيا. Deutsch: Blick von einem Hausdach auf Pripyat, im Hintergrund der Reaktor von Tschernobyl. Italiano: Vista di Chernobyl dall'alto di un palazzo in Pripyat, Ucraina. Foto realizzata da Jason Minshull. Español: Vista de Chernobyl tomada desde el tejado de un edificio en Pripyat, Ucrania. Foto tomada por Jason Minshull. Suomi: Kuva rakennuksen katolta Pripjatista, Ukrainasta. Taustalla näkyy tuhoutunut reaktori. Kuvannut Jason Minshull. Ελληνικά: Άποψη της μονάδας παραγωγής ενέργειας του Chernobyl που ελήφθει από την οροφή ενός κτιρίου κατοικιών στο Pripyat της Ουκρανίας. 日本語: チェルノブイリ原子力発電所（中央奥）の遠景。Jason Minshull撮影 Nederlands: Weergave van Tsjernobyl genomen van het dak van een gebouw in Pripyat, Oekraïne. Polski: Widok z dachu domu opuszczonego miasta Prypeć. Slovenčina: Pohľad na elektráreň Černobyľ odfotený z obytného domu v Pripjati, Ukrajina. Slovenščina: Zapuščeno mesto Pripjat z jedrsko elektrarno Černobil v ozadju 中文: 從烏克蘭普里皮亞特鎮的廢棄住宅頂樓遠眺車諾比核電廠 Русский: Припять. Вид на Чернобыльскую АЭС и город с крыши жилого дома. עברית: פריפיאט. מבט על הכור הגרעיני בצ'רנוביל מגג של בית מגורים בעיר פריפייאט (כ-3 ק"מ מצ'רנוביל) Português: Vista de Chernobyl retirado do telhado de um prédio em Pripyat, na Ucrânia. Foto tirada por Jason Minshull. 한국어: 프리피야트에 있는 건물 지붕에서 찍은 체르노빌의 전경. Jason Minshull이 촬영. Magyar: A csernobili atomerőmű látképe egy pripjatyi ház tetejéről fényképezve. Készítette: Jason Minshull
context_page_description: The Atomic Age, also known as the Atomic Era, is the period of history following the detonation of the first nuclear weapon, The Gadget at the Trinity test in New Mexico, on July 16, 1945, during World War II. Although nuclear chain reactions had been hypothesized in 1933 and the first artificial self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction had taken place in December 1942, the Trinity test and the ensuing bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki that ended World War II represented the first large-scale use of nuclear technology and ushered in profound changes in sociopolitical thinking and the course of technology development.
  While atomic power was promoted for a time as the epitome of progress and modernity, entering into the nuclear power era also entailed frightful implications of nuclear warfare, the Cold War, mutual assured destruction, nuclear proliferation, the risk of nuclear disaster, as well as beneficial civilian applications in nuclear medicine. It is no easy matter to fully segregate peaceful uses of nuclear technology from military or terrorist uses, which complicated the development of a global nuclear-power export industry right from the outset.
context_section_description: French advocates of nuclear power developed an aesthetic vision of nuclear technology as art to bolster support for the technology. Leclerq compares the nuclear cooling tower to some of the grandest architectural monuments of western culture:
  The age in which we live has, for the public, been marked by the nuclear engineer and the gigantic edifices he has created. For builders and visitors alike, nuclear power plants will be considered the cathedrals of the 20th century. Their syncretism mingles the conscious and the unconscious, religious fulfilment and industrial achievement, the limitations of uses of materials and boundless artistic inspiration, utopia come true and the continued search for harmony.
  In 1973, the United States Atomic Energy Commission predicted that, by the turn of the 21st century, one thousand reactors would be producing electricity for homes and businesses across the USA. But after 1973, reactor orders declined sharply as electricity demand fell and construction costs rose. Many orders and partially completed plants were cancelled.
  Nuclear power has proved controversial since the 1970s. Highly radioactive materials may overheat and escape from the reactor building. Nuclear waste (spent nuclear fuel) needs to be regularly removed from the reactors and disposed of safely for up to a million years, so that it does not pollute the environment. Recycling of nuclear waste has been discussed, but it creates plutonium which can be used in weapons, and in any case still leaves much unwanted waste to be stored and disposed of. Large, purpose-built facilities for long-term disposal of nuclear waste have been difficult to site, and have not yet reached fruition.
  By the late 1970s, nuclear power suffered a remarkable international destabilization, as it was faced with economic difficulties and widespread public opposition, coming to a head with the Three Mile Island accident in 1979, and the Chernobyl disaster in 1986, both of which adversely affected the nuclear power industry for decades thereafter. A cover story in the February 11, 1985, issue of Forbes magazine commented on the overall management of the nuclear power program in the United States:
  The failure of the U.S. nuclear power program ranks as the largest managerial disaster in business history, a disaster on a monumental scale … only the blind, or the biased, can now think that the money has been well spent. It is a defeat for the U.S. consumer and for the competitiveness of U.S. industry, for the utilities that undertook the program and for the private enterprise system that made it possible.
  So, in a period just over 30 years, the early dramatic rise of nuclear power went into equally meteoric reverse. With no other energy technology has there been a conjunction of such rapid and revolutionary international emergence, followed so quickly by equally transformative demise.
caption: A photograph taken in the abandoned city of Pripyat. The Chernobyl nuclear power plant can be seen on the horizon.
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