North Korea, which carried out attacks on the South Korean island of Yeonpyeong yesterday, could build one or two bombs' worth of enriched uranium per year once the new enrichment capability starts operating fullflegedly, according to a nuclear forecaster. Hui Zhang of the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, made this appraisal following the claims by an engineer and two nuclear policy specialist from Stanford University in California that they saw an industrial-scale uranium enrichment plant in a visit a few days before to North Korea.
Engineer Siegfried Hecker, former director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, and his two generation had also said that they were "stunned" to see a major new enrichment facility at the country's Yongbyon nuclear multifaceted, saying: "We saw a modern, clean centrifuge plant of more than 1000 centrifuges all efficiently aligned." North Korean officials reportedly told the group that the plant has 2000 centrifuges that are already being used to divide fissile uranium-235 from the more abundant uranium-238.
Based on these claims, Zhang said that if that is true, “North Korea could create 30 to 40 kilograms of extremely enriched uranium per year”, enough for one or two nuclear weapons. The number of centrifuges is suitable if they are actually intended to create fuel for a small, experimental nuclear power plant like the one North Korea is building, New Scientist report. According to Robert Alvarez of the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington DC, although North Korea is supposed to already possess plutonium base nuclear weapons, uranium based weapons can be more resourceful, allowing them to make more powerful explosions.
Engineer Siegfried Hecker, former director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, and his two generation had also said that they were "stunned" to see a major new enrichment facility at the country's Yongbyon nuclear multifaceted, saying: "We saw a modern, clean centrifuge plant of more than 1000 centrifuges all efficiently aligned." North Korean officials reportedly told the group that the plant has 2000 centrifuges that are already being used to divide fissile uranium-235 from the more abundant uranium-238.
Based on these claims, Zhang said that if that is true, “North Korea could create 30 to 40 kilograms of extremely enriched uranium per year”, enough for one or two nuclear weapons. The number of centrifuges is suitable if they are actually intended to create fuel for a small, experimental nuclear power plant like the one North Korea is building, New Scientist report. According to Robert Alvarez of the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington DC, although North Korea is supposed to already possess plutonium base nuclear weapons, uranium based weapons can be more resourceful, allowing them to make more powerful explosions.
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