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50 years of thorium reactor R&D and it isn't ready for prime time?
Edited by dduggerbiocepts
Updated - 8th Jun 2012
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Thorium reactor-- harder to build than a uranium reactor
Edited by madboy_heterodyne
Updated - 12th Dec
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nuclear power
I wonder which will come first--cold fusion or thorium reactors?
Posted by pauc1
8th Jun 2012
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Thorium is way ahead of fusion
Well, cold fusion is still controversial-- *some* strange reaction is occurring, but it is not highly reproducible, is not supported by any well-understood theory, and there is so far no evidence that the Pons-Fleischmann effect can be scaled up since nobody can explain it (if the effect is even real). Cold fusion requires discovery of "new physics" probably involving metal lattice interactions with bound nuclear states.
Thorium reactors on the other hand involve no new physics. All the ideas are 30 to 50 years old and there are enormous databases of information allowing every detail of a thorium reactor to be modeled in the computer. There are however still some economics and chemical engineering issues to be worked out for the molten salt reactor-- how to remove the fission products from the liquid fuel in the most cost-effective manner, and how to guarantee the molten salt reactor will be as safe as a Generation III conventional reactor is now. These are expensive questions but not "deal-breakers." A truly determined advanced nation could solve these problems in one or two decades, if not for political opposition.
So thorium reactors appear to have a huge head start over cold fusion reactors, or any kind of fusion reactors (hot fusion) for that matter.
Thorium reactors on the other hand involve no new physics. All the ideas are 30 to 50 years old and there are enormous databases of information allowing every detail of a thorium reactor to be modeled in the computer. There are however still some economics and chemical engineering issues to be worked out for the molten salt reactor-- how to remove the fission products from the liquid fuel in the most cost-effective manner, and how to guarantee the molten salt reactor will be as safe as a Generation III conventional reactor is now. These are expensive questions but not "deal-breakers." A truly determined advanced nation could solve these problems in one or two decades, if not for political opposition.
So thorium reactors appear to have a huge head start over cold fusion reactors, or any kind of fusion reactors (hot fusion) for that matter.
Posted by madboy_heterodyne
12th Dec
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50 years of thorium reactor R&D and it isn't ready for prime time?
There have already been many thorium prototype reactors built over the past 50 years.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thorium_reactor#List_of_thorium-fueled_reactors)
In almost all cases the reactors tested were safer than uranium reactors, cheaper to build and operate (thorium being 400 times more abundant than uranium) than uranium based reactors, feasible at smaller scales, and without melt down risks of uranium reactors. We don't need more R&D, we need commercial deployment and optimization. The only thing that has kept thorium reactors from replacing nuclear reactors - is an the influence (ownership) by the uranium industry and the military industrial complex of our governmental decisions making bodies. Thorium reactors are long past the R&D stage and it's time to hold the US Congress and the Executive Branch responsible for the uranium liabilities it has created - not only in the US, but globally.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thorium_reactor#List_of_thorium-fueled_reactors)
In almost all cases the reactors tested were safer than uranium reactors, cheaper to build and operate (thorium being 400 times more abundant than uranium) than uranium based reactors, feasible at smaller scales, and without melt down risks of uranium reactors. We don't need more R&D, we need commercial deployment and optimization. The only thing that has kept thorium reactors from replacing nuclear reactors - is an the influence (ownership) by the uranium industry and the military industrial complex of our governmental decisions making bodies. Thorium reactors are long past the R&D stage and it's time to hold the US Congress and the Executive Branch responsible for the uranium liabilities it has created - not only in the US, but globally.
Posted by dduggerbiocepts
Updated - 8th Jun 2012
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Re: 50 years of thorium reactor R&D and it isn't ready for prime time?
I have read the Wikipedia articles, and agree with you completely, except in one respect -- let us forge ahead with rigor, vigor, and forgiveness. The future will happen faster this way.
Posted by RetiredEngineer
9th Jun 2012
+2
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Thorium reactor-- harder to build than a uranium reactor
It's not quite as simple as that. Uranium contains a small fraction of fissile U235, while thorium contains no fissile isotope. As a result, a thorium reactor must be a *breeder* reactor, a uranium reactor does not have to be. This is the main reason uranium was used for nuclear weapons (instead of thorium) and it is the same reason why uranium reactors got a head start over thorium reactors. To put it simply, a uranium reactor must recycle 45% of its neutrons to maintain the chain reaction. A breeder reactor (including any thorium reactor) must recycle 90% of its neutrons-- because for every fissile atom destroyed, one neutron is needed to convert another thorium atom to fissile material, and one more neutron is needed to maintain the chain reaction. This is a significant engineering challenge. Solutions to this challenge were known as early as 1950 but there were always drawbacks slowing the engineering development and causing the proposed thorium reactors to be more expensive, not less expensive than the uranium reactors. Even today it is not obvious that the thorium reactor will actually be cheaper-- it is the cost of the power plant, not the cost of the fuel, that determines 90% of the cost of nuclear energy. And since a commercial thorium power plant has not yet been built and operated, (Germany built one but decommissioned it immediately) it is hard to "prove" that a thorium reactor will be any cheaper. Thus private companies are reluctant to gamble on this technology-- it will take strong government leadership to move it forward.
Posted by madboy_heterodyne
Updated - 12th Dec