Concerns increase with US uranium enrichment plans

General Electric (GE) is seeking permission to build a uranium enrichment plant using a $ 1 billion laser technology.

After two years of enrichment testing, GE asked the government to approve a plan to build a large-scale uranium factory in North Carolina.

The U.S. uranium enrichment plan has raised concerns among scientists that they will be exploited by secret terrorist organizations to produce secret nuclear weapons.

"We are currently optimizing the design," Christopher Monetta, director of Global Uranium Enrichment Company, a subsidiary of GE and Hitachi, said.

If licensed, the plant will provide enough fuel for 60 large nuclear reactors, capable of supplying electricity to 42 million households in the US but will become a major threat to mankind. , the New York Times said.

Uranium enrichment can be used to produce fuel for nuclear reactors and as fission materials for atomic warheads. New technology is considered dangerous because it can make nuclear bombs easier. Scientists fear the technology will be used by bad nations or terrorist groups to produce secret nuclear weapons.

"We are threatened by the technology to produce new atomic bombs," said Frank von Hippel, a nuclear physicist who was an adviser to former President Bill Clinton.