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Could nuclear bombs be harnessed to help people?

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As the Cold War raged on in the 1950s, scientists building nuclear weapons began to ponder whether they could be put toward positive ends.

In 1953, President Dwight D. Eisenhower broadcast this sentiment at the United Nations with his “Atoms for Peace” speech. There, he promised that the United States would “devote its entire heart and mind to find the way by which the miraculous inventiveness of man shall not be dedicated to his death but consecrated to his life.”

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This pledge paved the way for a nuclear energy boom in the United States, but it also prompted some outlandish proposals. For example, after Egypt nationalized and shut down the Suez Canal in 1956, scientists at the Lawrence Radiation Laboratory in California suggested a way to reconnect Europe with the Middle East: 520 nuclear blasts could open up a passage through the Negev desert.

This never came to fruition, and “was less of a plan than a thought experiment,” according to an article from the Science History Institute. The next year, scientists met at the same lab to brainstorm the best ways to use nuclear explosives for good.

That symposium spurred the creation of Project Plowshare in 1957. With this program, set up by the federal Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), scientists and politicians hoped to use nuclear explosives for industrial uses, including mining, building canals, and producing natural gas. As the “Father of the Hydrogen Bomb,” theoretical physicist Edward Teller said, “If your mountain is not in the right place, drop us a card.”

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For the first major move of Project Plowshare, scientists envisioned an artificial harbor on the northwest coast of Alaska forged with a chain of hydrogen bombs: four 100-kiloton bombs and two 1-megaton bombs set off beneath the coast. Project Chariot kicked off in 1958, and Teller claimed that it would benefit the local economy and enable coal mining.

“If Chariot is successful,” Teller said, “we will have the knowledge and experience for creating a harbor wherever one is needed. Its size and shape can be tailored to the local requirements.”

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It didn’t seem like a very practical undertaking—the waters in that area of Alaska, known as Cape Thompson, are frozen solid for most of the year. The researchers told nearby Indigenous Iñupiat communities that ice and wind would carry the resulting radiation far off, but in reality, testing by the AEC revealed that it would be impossible to direct the fallout, which could reach the areas people relied on for hunting and contaminate groundwater.

And according to studies of local plants, animals, and people at the time, lichen had already taken up radioactive fallout from nuclear testing around the world. These substances made their way to people via the caribou they ate.

To gauge how nuclear explosions might spread through the area, in 1962 the U.S. Geological Survey brought over soil that was contaminated with radioactive elements from the Nevada Test Site. After this test, the soil was then stored nearby until the Department of Energy removed it in 1993.

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Residents spoke out against the project, citing the devastating impacts of the test at Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands a couple of years earlier. Locals organized with scientists and other Iñupiat communities to oppose the explosions, forming what’s now known as the Alaska Conservation Foundation. In response, the project shut down in 1962. This successful collaboration helped galvanize the modern environmental movement in Alaska.

“They thought that they could push everybody around, and they suddenly discovered they were up against an informed citizenry,” said Celia Hunter, co-founder of the Alaska Conservation Foundation.

Now, fears of nuclear fallout have resurfaced as the Trump administration takes steps toward resuming nuclear testing, which hasn’t occurred in the U.S. since 1992—but this time around, civilian infrastructure doesn’t appear to be on the agenda.

Edward Teller Tried to Move Mountains With Nuclear Bombs