Title: Physical, Nuclear, and Chemical Properties of Plutonium - Institute for Energy and Environmental Research
Headings: Physical, Nuclear, and Chemical Properties of Plutonium
Physical, Nuclear, and Chemical Properties of Plutonium
Nuclear Properties of Plutonium
Chemical properties and hazards of plutonium.
Important Plutonium Compounds and their Uses
Formation and Grades of Plutonium-239
Bibliography

Content: This means that in most cases it is very difficult to separate isotopes from each other by chemical techniques. Only two plutonium isotopes have commercial and military applications. Plutonium-238, which is made in nuclear reactors from neptunium-237, is used to make compact thermoelectric generators; plutonium-239 is used for nuclear weapons and for energy; plutonium-241, although fissile, (see next paragraph) is impractical both as a nuclear fuel and a material for nuclear warheads. Some of the reasons are far higher cost , shorter half-life, and higher radioactivity than plutonium-239. Isotopes of plutonium with mass numbers 240 through 242 are made along with plutonium-239 in nuclear reactors, but they are contaminants with no commercial applications. In this fact sheet we focus on civilian and military plutonium (which are interchangeable in practice–see Table 5), which consist mainly of plutonium-239 mixed with varying amounts of other isotopes, notably plutonium-240, -241, and -242. Plutonium-239 and plutonium-241 are fissile materials. This means that they can be split by both slow (ideally zero-energy) and fast neutrons into two new nuclei (with the concomitant release of energy) and more neutrons.