Title: Plutonium, Chemical Element - water, uses, elements, metal, number, name, symbol, property
Headings: PLUTONIUM
PLUTONIUM
Overview
SYMBOL
Pu
ATOMIC NUMBER
94
ATOMIC MASS
244.0642
Discovery and naming
Physical properties
Chemical properties
Occurrence in nature
Isotopes
Extraction
Uses
Using fuel to make fuel
Compounds
Health effects
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Content: Steam runs turbines that make electricity, but when the coal  burns up, it's gone. In a nuclear reactor, the breakdown of uranium-235 atoms gives off  energy like the burning of coal. Over time, most of the uranium-235  atoms are used up. But while this is happening, a new fuel is being  made! Atoms of plutonium-239 are being produced from atoms of  uranium-238. Some reactors are operated primarily to make plutonium, not  to make electricity. These reactors are called breeder reactors because  they generate new fuel as they operate. By contrast, plutonium-239 can be made fairly easily in nuclear power  reactors. It is a by-product, or "waste product," of these reactors. It can be removed from the reactor, purified, and then  re-used to make electrical power.