Most resource-poor countries have elaborate dreams of using the heat from atomic reactors to generate electricity. But practical Norway may well become the first nation to make commercial use of nuclear energy. Reason: Norway is willing to settle for first things first, is already at work on a nuclear reactor that will use heat directly to produce steam, widely used in the wood-cooking process in Norwegian paper mills.
Norway's first practical reactor—using natural uranium and a heavy water moderator—is being built beside a paper mill at Halden, south of Oslo. To be finished...