This book follows a small public agency in Washington State that undertook one of the most ambitious construction projects in the nation in the 1970s: the building of five large nuclear power plants. By 1983, delays and cost overruns, along with slowed growth of electricity demand, led to cancellation of two plants and a construction halt on two others. Moreover, the agency defaulted on $2.25 billion of municipal bonds, leading to a monumental court case that took nearly a decade to resolve fully. Daniel Pope sets this in the context of the postwar boom's ending, the energy shocks of the 1970s, a new restraint in forecasting demand, and shifting patterns of municipal finance. Nuclear Implosions also traces the entangling alliance between civilian nuclear energy and nuclear weapons and recounts a telling example of how the law has become a primary method of resolving disputes in a litigious society.

Review of the hardback:'In Nuclear Implosions: The Rise and Fall of the Washington Public Power Supply System, Daniel Pope provides a(n) … extensive and retrospective analysis of a previous push for the expansion of civil nuclear power in Washington State in the US.'

Source: St Antony's International Review

'Pope’s important history might be relied upon to predict dubious prospects for nuclear power anywhere in the country, not just in the northwest.'

Bruce Hevly - University of Washington