Talk:Project Plowshare

Any truth to this?

NO. Other than the spelling errors, as one who worked in the Plowshare Program for 25 years, this story is completely false. Just check the newspapers to look at gas prices for that time. It is true that the Plowshare program looked at the Canadian tarsand deposits as a potential applicaton, but there was never any formal study or project to do any fieldwork or nuclear explosionMnordyke 16:25, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

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The following questionable paragraphs were inserted by an anon. at the end of the External links section. They obviously don't belong there, but since I'm having a hard time believing all the details, I don't feel I should just move them to a better place, so I reverted them until some reliable source is provided: Nonenmac 01:49, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

In 1961 a US/Canadian experiment was conducted in a remote part of the alberta tar fields in an attempt to free oil trapped there in scattered pockets in the tarry strata. A 10 kiloton device was detonated 15 September 1961. As expected, it blew a huge bubble which collapsed trapping 8========================D upwilling of high grade oil (the top 10 inches of the resulting lake could be run in deisel engines directly) that overflowed in a flood that overtaxed the storage capacity of both nations resulting in consumers seeing straight run gasoline at a pump price of 17 cents/gallon for 2 years.

The US Navy was, for the first time since WW II, authorized to refuel the ships of other nations at sea. The flood of cheap crude devestable the domestic oil industry of both nations. The experiment was classified as a failure and all trace of it has been removed from commone reference sources, including yours.

Operation Ploughshare redirect

Hi. I strongly recommend that someone with an account create a redirect from Operation Ploughshare to here it is a very common misspelling. Best. --70.48.242.16 22:51, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Also, while someone is at it, a disambiguation page for Ploughshare may be useful. Other meanings include:

• Ploughshare, is the cutting or leading edge of a moldboard.
• Operation Plowshare, development of uses of nuclear explosives for peaceful construction purposes.
• Plowshares Movement, responsible for actions that have taken place against weapons of war.

--70.48.242.16 22:54, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Technology information?

7 (Crazy) Civilian Uses for Nuclear Bombs says

Why was it possible for people to walk around a few months after the explosion? Nordyke said the Plowshare team designed a series of weapons that contained very little fissionable material, which is what makes radioactivity dangerous to humans.

"For excavation, we put a lot of time and effort and money into developing nuclear explosives which had minimal fissionable material so that you could carry out a 100-kiloton cratering explosion and release the radioactivity equivalent to a 20-ton explosive of fissionable material," Nordyke said.

But despite the technical success of the Plowshare program, Nordyke doesn't see nuclear weapons being used for excavation or mining anytime soon because it doesn't seem politically feasible.

"I think its time came and went," he said. "I think reconciling it with the enhanced environmental concerns today and the inherent association with weapons is difficult."

How about adding information on the technology involved, and details of how minimal? --98.216.110.149 (talk) 19:21, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

reference dated prior to 1961

The term "Operation Plowshare" appears in the title of a 25 March 1958 feasability report for digging a canal across the Mexican Isthmus of Tehuantepec by Clifford M. Bacigalupi, Robert A. Miles, and Fred J. Warren (of Livermore Laboratory) at an OSTI web site: "Isthmus of Tehuantepec Investigation for Operation Plowshare". 69.126.127.193 (talk) 20:56, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

POV issue

This article seems to emphasize the negative aspects of Operation Plowshare, without discussing any possible positives, both in the introduction and within the body of the article. For an example of what seems a more balanced approach, see the article on the Soviet Union's Nuclear Explosions for the National Economy program.