Idaho experience is made possible with funding from the James and Barbara samino Foundation devoted to preserving the spirit of Idaho from Anne Vol and Louise Nelson from Judy and Steve Meyer the friends of Idaho public television the Idaho public television endowment and the Corporation for Public [Music] Broadcasting World War II was over national leaders who had rushed to build an atomic bomb to end the war were looking for a new way to prove the United States was a country not to be trifled with in the post-war world we can make an explosion but if we can control that radioactivity there's more we can do back then what we know as the Idaho National Lab uh was really a national reactor test facility and there was a lot of development in that area as the United United States was developing a nuclear reactor in the remote desert of Idaho the US Navy was working to develop its own reactor a few miles away Rick overlooked at atomic energy and realized we wouldn't have to refuel like we did during World War II in the middle of a action if we were using nuclear Admiral Hyman rickover known as the father of the Nuclear Navy was intent on developing a submarine engine that didn't rely on traditional fuel if successful it would make the US Navy a true world power he believed that nuclear power could offer a Warf fighting Advantage so he created an organization uh starting with a lot of learning that went on in 1946 while submarines and aircraft carriers are built near oceans the reactors that powered those ships were built here in Idaho if any state has a DNA connection to the Nuclear Navy it is Idaho the very first nuclear ship the the Nautilus a nuclear submarine the propulsion system was designed and built in Idaho Eastern Idaho but Admiral Rick over brought the naval reactors to Idaho it's been a great boom to the state of Idaho and to the Navy 40 thousand Sailors would rotate through Idaho as part of their training before being assigned to nuclear-powered ships and I grew up in Idaho falls with all of those Sailors uh and they they made a big impact on our community they were welcomed they were loved the people in the community were really proud of the fact that we could be a part of our National Defense Idaho experience takes a look at the original prototypes at the naval reactors facility in Eastern Idaho now being demolished take a look at the historic work being done at the remote and restricted facility that few get to see this is Idaho's Nuclear Navy on Idaho [Music] experience in Eastern Idaho the Arco desert is an isolated Windswept landscape full of Sagebrush and wildlife in some places it extends beyond what the eye can see in the 1940s the land was a bombing range for the Army and artillery range used by the Navy but the atomic energy commission created after World War II saw this as a land of opportunity it would soon be the home of the national reactor testing station when Pearl Harbor was attacked the United States military complex was not like it is today in fact it was pretty weak and the Army and the Navy had to start building up their systems for the Army and Navy for National Defense almost immediately after Japan bombed Pearl Harbor in 1941 president President Franklin D Roosevelt began to build up military supplies and equipment that included a Navy ordinance plant outside Pocatello the Navy has a long history with the state of Idaho back in the in the 40s and earlier it was a Proving Ground for uh Naval battleships and gunfire so we actually tested and improved uh the ability to operate guns out there large guns that were on our warships the Pocatello Naval ordinance plant was commissioned in April 1942 the plant was built to manufacture repair and assemble large guns on naval ships those guns have a very short life once you start firing them they can only handle so many rounds through before the lining breaks apart so they have to be refit pretty regular ly and the Navy needed a place where they could do that and it had to be someplace away from the coast because there was still no idea whether or not our Coast would be attacked once repaired the guns had to be tested the massive 16-in guns were loaded onto a train and sent into the desert between Idaho Falls and Arco it was known as the Arco Naval Proving Ground roughly 270 square miles of flat ground in the middle of nowhere we had to uh shoot projectiles miles and miles and so we needed a big open spot in order to be able to do that so they would take the barrels out and they picked a spot over there by hardco and they would Mount the gun on a stationary platform and they would fire it to make sure that the the lining was fit properly and the gun worked properly when the Pocatello Naval ordinance plant closed in 1949 the naval Proving Ground was no longer needed uh shortly after World War II the atomic energy commission was formed and it was a new demand of taking this new technology nuclear power and ultimately use it for commercial applications and the potential of using it for Naval applications back then what we know is the Idaho National Lab was really a national reactor test facility and there was a lot of development in that area similar to the Top Secret Manhattan project that built the atomic bomb the US government was in a race to use nuclear fision to produce power since most of the artillery range was no longer needed the federal government decided on the Aron Naval Proving Ground to build a firstof its kind nuclear clear reactor it was actually competitive at that point I believe Montana was in the running but ultimately we decided that it was in an area that was already being utilized for testing purposes and it was also the National Drive so both of those were critical for the decision of where that was made and there was this idea that you know we can make an explosion but if we can control that radio activity there's more we can do we were trying to understand how to commercialize uh nuclear power but also how to apply it construction on the new National reactor testing station began in the mid 1940s here there are more reactors of more advanced and different types than in any equivalent anywhere this rolling desert plane has been nicknamed prototype Prairie while the civilian side was working on an experimental breeder reactor ebr1 another project was in the works by the United States Navy what was it like back in World War II submarine Force obviously added significant value but they were diesel submarines and while they had significant War fighting capabilities they had one Achilles heel and that Achilles heel was that they were diesel powered and they needed air in order to operate the Diesels to recharge the batteries effectively diesel submarines were uh surface ships that momentarily submerged underneath the ocean in order to be very stealthy in order to conduct thir War fighting operations the Navy selected one man to find a solution to the submarine problem Captain Hyman [Music] rickover rickover became an admiral later in his career he started um at lower rank but he was a a brilliant man just a very unique individual a very focused man you know we might say now that he was obsessive compulsive and he was able to lead his people that way too in 1946 a group of naval officers and civilians were assigned to work on the Manhattan engineered District's Daniels power pile project at the Clinton Laboratories now the atomic energy commission's Oakridge National Laboratory Oakridge Tennessee senior member was Captain later vice admiral HG rickover a qualified sub Mariner and engineer with a strong faith in both the practicality and necessity of atomic propulsion uh he believed that nuclear power could offer a Warf fighting Advantage so he created an organization uh starting with a lot of learning that went on in 1946 but the organization partnered with the atomic energy commission and set out to uh lay the groundwork for having a nuclear powered submarine a reactor encased in heavy shielding contains fuel elements of Highly enriched uranium once the Navy had a plan it needed to prove that it worked it made sense to utilize the national reactor testing station in Idaho to build the Prototype Naval reactor construction began the fall of 1950 a few miles north of ebr1 working at a fevered pace it was well underway the following summer the Navy with uh the federal government brought in the best of breed out there we brought in electric boat to create and build the uh s1w prototype we brought in the Argon National Laboratory to do the design work on the reactor plan we brought in the Bettis facility in Westinghouse to design the propulsion [Music] plant the main building pump house and gate house were the first to be completed in 1951 but an early issue the project had was Finding components for the reactor because this was a first of its kind reactor there weren't Parts you could buy off the shelf so Captain rickover had to find someone to build them from scratch when he stood up the nuclear power program he needed industry to produce components with precision and high quality at the time the industry didn't think they could do that he had to create the authorities and responsibilities and get all those aligned with the resources to do this uh to deliver nuclear power for the nation but because of his persistence and demanding nature he was able to achieve that and that sets the foundation for everything that we do today the submarine thermal reactor project came came to be known as s1w reflecting that the reactor was built by westing house the s1w Prototype submarine first generation Westinghouse was The Proving Ground for the Nautilus it allowed us to prove out the concepts to work on the equipment locations in a tight constrained Hull to prove out the shielding and to prove out that all of the components were going to work it Al allowed us to train operators as the United States worked on its nuclear reactors President Eisenhower pushed the United Nations to do the same his effort was known as adoms for peace United States knows that peaceful power from atomic energy is no dream of the future that capability already proved is here now today a special purpose would be to provide abundant electrical energy in the power starred areas of the world on December 20th 1951 nuclear fision lit four light bulbs at the experimental breeder reactor 1 the world's first electricity generating nuclear power plant just down the road the Navy was also making Headway on the submarine project in March 30th of 1953 s1w went to critical for the first time and believe it or not that was only 70 years ago after some reactor physics testing the s1w Prototype then went to full power operations and that simulated a submarine going full speed across the Atlantic and that was a GameChanger compared to what a diesel submarine could do the s1w Prototype was unique Rick over demanded that that it not just generate power but that it operate safely underwater in the tight confines of a submarine ebr1 had already lit lights he wasn't worried about that he wanted to see can it fit inside of a submarine so they didn't just build a reactor they built a reactor and put it in the Shell of a submarine engine room because he wanted to see how are the engineers going to work with it are they going to be able to get to different pieces can it be done safely what happens when you have a problem where are your procedure is going to be out in the middle of the Atlantic when you start to get some radiation leak in the water so he set that up for s1w and the the development time was insane there was a pool of some 300,000 gallons that surrounded the uh the Prototype and that was to test all the interfaces with the c the Navy proved the reactor could work but rickover was determined to push the limits once the core had been replaced he asked that s1w operate even longer the s1w Prototype operated at 100% reactor power for 66 days and that was equivalent to Circle navigating the Earth twice pretty amazing accomplishment and that really prove the viability of nuclear power in a in a warship that testing in Idaho proved the Navy could use nuclear power to operate safely and effectively that led to the world's first nuclear submarine the USS Nautilus it was commissioned in 1954 and left the shipyard in Grotton Connecticut in 1955 the Nautilus was terrible ifying for the Soviet Union it sailed underneath the polar ice cap without having to surface and their submarines couldn't follow it the United States had this ship now or this boat that could go out get right up on the Soviet Union's front doorstep and they wouldn't have any idea it was a strategic move as much as it was a technical move with the submarine problem solved the naval reactors program immediately started working on AAR larger reactor to power an aircraft carrier the Nautilus went to sea in 1955 and then the naels went under the pole in 1958 under the arctic ice at the same time we started uh building the a1w prototype in 1956 a1w aircraft carrier first generation Westinghouse was built with rickover's attention to detail and safety the reactor design was would power the very first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier the USS Enterprise being built in 1958 when you look at the USS Enterprise it was to have eight reactors and four engine rooms so he wanted to mock that up where are we going to put the reactor how are we going to Shield it we're going to have a lot of heat off of it how's that going to affect the crew how can the engineers get to the reactors and run them in tandem it's these questions that he wanted to solve in that environment that was completely controlled before he tried to build a ship it was light years ahead of what anybody else could imagine doing with technology and again it was that driving personality of Rick over how does a reactor power a naval ship nuclear fion breaks apart atoms creating heat heat turns water to steam and steam turns the drive shafts Steam on an aircraft carrier also helps aircraft take off powering the catapults we started up the first reactor in October of 1958 the second reactor in January of 1959 and then Enterprise went to see in 1961 an astounding record of pace and performance and commitment by the United States and that all started right there in Idaho the USS Enterprise was retired in 2017 it proved the concept for future carriers like the USS Dwight D Eisenhower that's still in service today while the Enterprise had eight reactors the Eisenhower has just two it can hold up to 5,000 Sailors and launch up to four aircraft off its deck in roughly a minute in 2023 the Eisenhower known as The Mighty Ike was sent to the Mediterranean it is scheduled to be retired in 2028 replaced by a new USS Enterprise currently under construction at an estimated cost of $13 billion each new ship Builds on the Lessons Learned in Idaho those first of-a-kind prototypes were also perfect for Sailors who needed hands-on experience before being assigned to a ship Rick over believed that you needed to actually operate a nuclear power plant and to train on that nuclear power plant and then we showed up out at the uh Naval reactors facility s1w prototype the first 6 weeks was classroom training it was understanding all of the systems that you were going to have to understand and operate that were unique to the s1w Prototype a sailor at the time would attend basic training then nuclear a school before getting Hands-On training at s1w in that third phase Sailors were subjected to long hours of studying and operating a working reactor and so a typical day was about 18 hours you would sleep wake up the next day and go through your training and you would do that literally until you ran out of food and then you'd come back on the bus you'd get replenish yourself and you go back out there not everybody passed um a lot of guys washed out because they didn't have the ability to do the math or they didn't have the mechanical ability I do remember getting there in uh like September of 1988 and leaving in March and I think I was frozen for the entire 6 months and I remember getting up catching the bus at uh 4 in the morning and then the 60 Mi out to to NRF and you got off off the bus and in my case I went to s1w I think I can draw everything that I learned you know almost 35 years ago that's how good the training was there was like a little Central Library if you want to call it and you went up there and you uh you checked out a manual or an operating procedure or something like that you take that back and you'd study and you'd learn about those things and then you may walk into the actual prototype I've heard it compared to like a very uh Elite College of four years you know crammed into to 6 months not everyone that went through prototype training was a sailor some were civilians like Doug Leno and Kelly French Leno had just finished school at the University of Arizona in 1987 westing house was recruiting down there and i' host on like a fun place to be cuz I like the outdoors I was one of the first classes to actually be embedded with the naval officers I qualified on the plant then turned around and started training Navy students now you've come from nuclear power school where they've trained you on the theory behind everything so you understand that but now you're looking at the actual systems that you've looked at on paper and you're looking at all these piping systems and electrical wires and you're trying to think oh my gosh I got to know how all this works and where everything is and it's it's somewhat overwhelming at first what people may not realize is how noisy of a place it was cuz when the plant's operating you have all kinds of rotating equipment there's a unique smell inside of a prototype having to do with a lot of the the oils that are used in the machinery and those get into some of the lagging it gets in there and it sort of creates this this smell that's very unique I served a des W from uh February of 1983 until the final shutdown and a little bit beyond February of 1990 I then transferred to the s5g Prototype where I qualified again as engineering offic of the watch s5g submarine fifth generation General Electric is an advanced pressurized water reactor that lets the Navy evaluate the reactor's performance perance in simulated ocean conditions looked like a portion of a submarine set in a basin that would rock and roll they would fill it with water and rock and roll but that was before my time the Prototype actually floated on the water and we could incline that prototype or roll that prototype uh so that we could test out the performance of the reactor plant under more uh emblematic or prototypical C uh conditions really really important for the Navy by the time s5g was retired in 1995 the last of the prototypes in Idaho to go offline 40,000 Sailors had rotated through the naval reactors facility but Idaho has been vitally important to us it's the birth of our program it's where we learned about the development of these Technologies where we trained 40,000 operators sailor training at the three prototypes ended in the mid90s but the naval reactors facility in the Eastern Idaho desert remains active uh there's only one place that will process that fuel and that is at the naval reactors facility and that is uh basically taking that spent Fuel and placing it in a road ready condition to take to the National repository absolutely critical part of the mission as long as there is a nuclear powered Fleet there's going to be a naval reactor facility in order to process that uh that fuel nuclear power provides our Navy with phenomenal Warf fighting Advantage but we have to respect the power and reactor we have to treat it with the proper stewardship and the proper respect our Sailors live right next to a nuclear reactor they live and function near a nuclear reactor every single day so to do that that we have to design a system that is conservative by Design and we can only do that by the trust that's been established and enabled and that trust is centered on as I said protecting our Sailors our workers the local populations and the environment there has never been a reactor accident in the naval nuclear propulsion program and nor has there ever been a release that has affected the environment the United States isn't the only country country using nuclear powerered ships but it has the most capable submarines thanks to research and development conducted in Idaho in 2024 the US Navy plans to commission the USS Idaho a nuclear submarine that uses Advanced reactors and acoustic technology developed right here in the state it was named for well how is it that Idaho a landlocked state has a nuclear submarine named Idaho if any state has a DNA connection to the Nuclear Navy it is Idaho the very first nuclear ship ever made the N Nautilus a nuclear submarine that Dwight Eisenhower used to send from the Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic for the first time ever under the Arctic the world said my word the United States is back it's the leader in science it's the leader in the military former Idaho Governor Dirk kempthorne is Chairman of the USS Idaho commissioning committee he is responsible for bringing the crew to Idaho and showing them the surprising role this landlock state has played in developing submarine technology the fact that the United States submarine force is the most silent in the world well that doesn't just happen that that means you have the finest of Technology where does that technology come from Idaho Lake pandere bayew the Acoustic Research Center again the role that Idaho plays in the well-being of the nation making sure that our submarines are the most silent and most technologically advanced one might wonder why the historic prototypes with such a rich history of innovation aren't being turned into museums like ebr1 what Rick over did in the Arco desert changed the nation and changed the world what he did in those buildings was truly historic every bit is historic as ebr1 the question is well why why tear them down why can't we leave them there and use it for Education well these were nuclear testing facilities and so you have contamination you know they're bringing in cores taking out cores they operated for decades and the United States requires that we clean up our messes some parts and pieces of s1w and the other two prototypes will likely be in a museum someday soon like the Idaho State Museum in Boise we have over 100,000 cubic feet of government records a half million photographs 50,000 artifacts 880,000 archaeological specimens and all of those things are the anchors and cornerstones of the stories we tell through exhibitions and programs and our portfolio is quite full from an audience point of view the story of s1w will live on thanks to an effort that goes back to 1966 president Lynden B Johnson signed the National Historic preservation act that requires federal agencies to make preservation a part of the agency's mission and that act was created as a result of urban renewal in the ' 50s and 60s that caused a lot of inadvertent damage to communities and there was a fairly large Hue and cry across our country at the local level saying hey you know if there's going going to be development there's going to be projects that destroy our local resources we need to have a voice and out of that Collective voice across the whole country very powerful Grassroots effort came the Nationalist restor preservation act if a federal agency has an undertaking that has the potential to impact historic properties they have to take into consideration that those properties in their decision-making process and work with our office through a consultation process to try to avoid minimize or mitigate any adverse effects to Historic properties the most commonly known of which is probably the national Reg of historic places that is the official national list of those properties considered important in our past and worthy of preservation it's important that we preserve our history not just history you read about in a book but history that you can walk through that you can touch that you can smell and feel that's what's important about uh these types of uh programs that preserve our history before the naval nuclear propulsion program could start the demolition of the prototypes officials approached the Idaho State historic preservation office to start a conversation about how best to preserve the history of the reactors mitigation is what all parties can agree to so that's what we try to do we try to make it a win-win for the community and a win-win for the resource and a win-win for the entity that has to do the project so in this case with the project at the NRF to remove the nuclear Naval prototypes um that's a pretty big impact those are unique one-of-a-kind properties that um once lost will be gone forever and so um you know we went into consultation with the NRF staff and other parties other interested parties from a position of you know this is a pretty big impact and and we need to make sure that the consultation results in mitigation that's commensurate with that impact one of the things that's so amazing about inl is this huge site and it's been protected for a long time so the resources there are quite pristine so often when the inl team has to look at their role in implementing the National Historic preservation act and all of the requirements that federal agencies have they're very good at it and they know to call our team today there are historic preservation offices in all 50 states the preservation Act is enforced with the awareness that our past helps communities shape their identities and their Futures understanding the history of their Community gives them a sense of place in the Continuum of history and understanding history and thinking about the process of History also gives students in particular but all of us a better understanding of thinking critical thinking cause and effect why something is like what it is how are we here today that comes through understanding how to do analysis the NRF conducted um oral histories with Sailors who had been through the program and they sought them out Nationwide which was terrific I believe we have 30 oral histories from former Sailors that are going to be accessioned into the Idaho State archives now um this was critical of course because um many of them are reaching an age we we we're losing them you know more and more and so that was we felt a really critical piece of telling the story of the site was getting that um first person experience to share and so at s1w they had the water break which was you'd have a guy stationed out there and his job was to adjust the pressure on a Paddle Wheel to simulate uh sea pressure so that she don't cavitate you're going to get qualified in 24 weeks or 26 weeks this is how many points you need each week to stay on the curve as long as you're ahead of the curve why life is reasonable you get behind the curve then there percentages it's a positive encouragement delivered with a baseball bat s1w was a choice assignment uh uh relatively simple even I could understand it and the ADM riov used to call it his little tea kettle because it was simple rugged relable and then the intent was that hopefully those oral histories could um inform the documentary as well this documentary is part of an agreement between the naval reactors facility and the Idaho State historic preservation office this project has been in the works for several years to preserve the nrf's Idaho story because this story is so big we felt that the partnership with Idaho public television town telling this story was really critical for public understanding of The Amazing World value of the inl and the NRF if you look at some of the historical buildings and other things that we've preserved around the state of Idaho we're lucky in that we're a very young in terms of in terms of History to the rest of the world we can still preserve our history if we're smart enough to do it so preserving these reactor prototypes that are going to be torn down decommissioned and and uh destroyed uh I think is very important I grew up in Idaho falls with all of those Sailors uh and they they made a big impact on our community they were welcomed they were loved the people in the community were really proud of the fact that we could be a part of our National Defense and what's really interesting is a lot of them have stayed in Idaho or come back to Idaho after their military experience and it's because they got so ingrained into our community and loved our community just like we loved them [Music] I believe that efforts to preserve that Legacy like this that we're talking about right now are critical and I'm glad that there are people who are protecting this Legacy and making sure we keep it for people forever there is something in the water there is something in the water [Music] [Music] there's something in [Music] the Idaho experience is made possible with funding from the James and Barbara samino Foundation devoted to preserving the spirit of Idaho from anv and Louise Nelson from Judy and Steve Meyer the friends of Idaho public television the Idaho public television endowment and the Corporation for Public [Music] Broadcasting
