![](https://static01.nyt.com/images/2024/07/19/multimedia/19neff1-gjwl/19neff1-gjwl-facebookJumbo.jpg)
Thomas Neff, Who Turned Soviet Warheads Into Electricity, Dies at 80
As the Soviet Union disintegrated, Thomas L. Neff came up with an improbable idea. What if Soviet nuclear warheads could light up American cities rather than obliterate them? What if the United States could buy the uranium cores of the deadly arms and turn …