"Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said his country has produced its first batch of uranium enriched to 20%."Uranium for power needs to be enriched anywhere from 5% to 20% to work, the higher the better. For weapon purposes, it needs to be enriched to 90% to 95%, again, higher the better.
When Uranium is mined, it is roughly 99.3% Uranium 238 (U238) and about 0.7% Uranium 235 (U235.) Uranium 238 can be used for power, but it is difficult and there is little room for flexibility in the method. U235 is much better. This is what the enriching process does.
Enriching Uranium is getting more U235 and less U238 in a portion of Uranium. In unenriched Uranium (this is simply mined Uranium without anything done to it) on average, 1 in 140 molecules is U235. This is much, much too low to be used in either power or weapons. As mentioned earlier, power plants can use from 5-20% enriched and nuclear weapons need 90-95%. 90% enriched will barely work for weapons, 95% is really needed. To get Uranium to 20% is not too difficult, but to get it to 95% is very.
Iran is using a gas centrifuge method to enrich Uranium. This is a somewhat old, but is a tried and trusted method.
All the fuss over Iran enriching Uranium, at this point at least, is, I think, unnecessary. If Iran sticks with 20%, there is no chance they can use it against anyone and their claims are true of simply wanting more independence. If they go over 20%, they will have a difficult time getting it to 95%, or even 90%. The time it would take to get the 70% increase would leave plenty of time for another country to step in and stop them.
Sources:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8510451.stm
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