The Infrastructure Show's Episodes
With Host Professor Joseph Schofer of Northwestern University.
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Aerial view of Three Mile Island nuclear power plant, Pennsylvania, September, 2019, courtesy of Wikipedia Commons, Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license, author Groupmesa.
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Rebooting Three Mile Island
Posted July 2, 2025, Length: 22:20
In 1979, one of two nuclear reactors at the Three Mile Island power plant near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, suffered a partial meltdown. The second reactor was shut down 40 years later for economic reasons. Now, work is underway to restart that second reactor to produce electricity for a single customer, Microsoft. To learn what it takes to restart and ensure the safety of a nuclear power plant, and to explore the role of nuclear energy in a mix of renewable resources, we’ve invited back Dr. Elmer Lewis, professor emeritus of mechanical engineering at Northwestern University. Dr. Lewis is the author of the books “Nuclear Power Reactor Safety” and “Fundamentals of Nuclear Reactor Physics,” and he will soon publish his latest book, “Renewables or Nuclear, Which Should Lead in Curbing Climate Change?”
The Infrastructure Show is sponsored by Northwestern University.
Descriptions of photos at top of page, from left to right:
Bayonne Bridge, from Bayonne, NJ to Staten Island, NY;
the Tom Moreland Interchange in Atlanta, GA;
Dworshak Dam, in Clearwater County, ID;
a transmission substation in Orem, UT.
All photos courtesy of Wikipedia.