TED Talk on Liquid Thorium Fluoride Reactors. Yes, I'm advocating this kind of nuclear power.

[backscatter712]

I already know the flaws of using uranium-based nuclear power plants. And Kirk Sorenson talks about them a little in his talk.

Uranium plants are big, expensive, require pressurized hot water and steam to work at all, and if there's a pressure loss, or some sort of coolant failure, well, see Fukushima and Chernobyl...

Uranium fuel is inefficient, leaves NASTY waste products, requires infrastructure that's also capable of being retooled to refining uranium into plutonium to make nuclear weapons

Mining uranium is inefficient, very messy & toxic for the environment, and you have to throw out most of the uranium because you have to enrich it to extract the U235 useful for reactors.

But what if there was a better alternative. A nuclear power without most of the problems with nuclear power.

Imagine a reactor that cannot melt down, because the fuel is melted by design, and sits in the reactor as a liquid. It has a passive failsafe that ensures a Fukushima or Chernobyl-style accident is impossible. It does not run at super-high pressures like the giant-radioactive-teakettle water-cooled uranium reactors, consumes its fuel so completely that the radioactive waste problem is reduced by orders of magnitude (and some scientists have proposed using this new reactor type to consume waste fuel rods from old uranium reactors, thus solving that problem), has its fuel infrastructure set up in such a way that it's ridiculously difficult to make bombs.

Well, we can build them. The Department of Energy decided against building these kinds of reactors specifically because they were useless for bomb-making, so much of the technology has been sitting on the shelf collecting dust.

I give you Kirk Sorenson, and his TED talk about the Liquid Thorium Fluoride Reactor. I think these kinds of reactors can solve a lot of our energy problems. They can make us far less dependent on fossil fuels, which makes it so we can stop fighting and instigating destructive wars in the Middle East, stop tearing up our planet, and live sustainably.

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/kirk_sorensen_thorium_an_alternative_nuclear_fuel.html

[MadHound]

1. Huge expense problems,

Don't need to invest that sort of money when green alternatives are cheaper and can do the job.

And thorium reactors won't eliminate the waste problem. Granted, there will be much less fuel waste to deal with, but you will still have other waste, some of which is low level, some of which is quite hot. Everything from contaminated gloves to activated host cans, it is, by volume, the largest source of nuclear waste.

Again, why bother with it when green is cheaper, safer, and can pull the load?

[Selatius]

2. People are getting worried. A bunch of people favor a shotgun blast approach.

In other words, throw everything (including nuclear) at the problem and hope that does the trick. The nuclear lobby likes to cite France as an example. After the oil price shocks of the 1970s, the French government decided to get off coal and oil to run its power stations, so they began building dozens of nuclear reactors. They produce so much electricity today that they regularly sell excess power to neighbors like Germany and Spain.

The difference is that in France, regulatory standards are incredibly strict, and the power stations are publicly owned. There is no incentive to cut corners on safety standards just to squeeze extra profit out. Also, regulatory agencies in France suffer less than American agencies from what is known as "regulatory capture," basically where the agencies that are supposed to regulate businesses are run by the same people that are to be regulated. The biggest difference between the French approach and the American approach is that in France, politicians aren't swayed by private donations to lean one way or the other; that's illegal. They have publicly funded elections with taxpayer dollars.

[snooper2]

9. No, what we need is 100's of billions of dollars invested in fusion power

that is the be all end all !

[MadHound]

11. Fusion is, at this point, a pipe dream

Should we continue working on achieving it someday, certainly. But we should not engage in an open-ended crash program that neglects everything else.

Rather, transition to green energy, which is loads cheaper than nuclear, fission or fusion, and then progress from there.

[snooper2]

12. The really smart folks have already been able to sustain a fusion reaction..

of course it was for half a second but you start somewhere...

You should read up on ITER, ready around 2019 so right around the corner! And yes, U.S. is a contributer... But we need to start our own programs here, not just contribute to an effort International effort in France.

[MadHound]

18. Except that green alternatives are ready now,

They've gone through their experimental, break in phase, and are ready to shoulder the load now. Mass use of fusion is still decades away at least, and we simply don't have the time to wait for it.

[GopperStopper2680]

26. To snooper2

snooper: Even if the National Ignition Facility achieved sustainable fusion tomorrow it would still take decades more research and development to make reliable infrastructure that would help us generate power. We need to keep working on it but we need a viable interim solution.

[madokie]

3. If what is said about this type of reactor is true

Then this old anti-nuke is all for it. Bring it on I say
What we're doing right now is killing our planet, shitting in our nest so to say.

[kestrel91316]

7. What madokie said. I am against nuclear power for all

the usual reasons - mainly safety and long-term waste storage, but also unsustainablility due to limited fuel sources.

If they can pull this off as described, I say do it.

[Jim__]

4. Does this type of reactor require a U-235 (or plutoniom-239) trigger?

According to this fact sheet from the Physicians for Social Responsibilty, it does. An excerpt:

Thorium is not actually a “fuel” because it is not fissile and therefore cannot be used to start or sustain a nuclear chain reaction. A fissile material, such as uranium‐235 (U‐235) or plutonium‐239 (which is made in reactors from uranium‐238), is required to kick‐start the reaction. The enriched uranium fuel or plutonium fuel also maintains the chain reaction until enough of the thorium target material has been converted into fissile uranium‐233 (U‐ 233) to take over much or most of the job. An advantage of thorium is that it absorbs slow neutrons relatively efficiently (compared to uranium‐238) to produce fissile uranium‐233.

The use of enriched uranium or plutonium in thorium fuel has proliferation implications. Although U‐235 is found in nature, it is only 0.7 percent of natural uranium, so the proportion of U‐235 must be industrially increased to make “enriched uranium” for use in reactors. Highly enriched uranium and separated plutonium are nuclear weapons materials.

In addition, U‐233 is as effective as plutonium‐239 for making nuclear bombs. In most proposed thorium fuel cycles, reprocessing is required to separate out the U‐233 for use in fresh fuel. This means that, like uranium fuel with reprocessing, bomb‐making material is separated out, making it vulnerable to theft or diversion. Some proposed thorium fuel cycles even require 20% enriched uranium in order to get the chain reaction started in existing reactors using thorium fuel. It takes 90% enrichment to make weapons‐usable uranium, but very little additional work is needed to move from 20% enrichment to 90% enrichment. Most of the separative work is needed to go from natural uranium, which ahs0.7% uranium‐235 to 20% U‐235.

It has been claimed that thorium fuel cycles with reprocessing would be much less of a proliferation risk because the thorium can be mixed with uranium‐238. In this case, fissile uranium‐233 is also mixed with non‐fissile uranium‐238. The claim is that if the uranium‐238 content is high enough, the mixture cannot be used to make bombs without a complex uranium enrichment plant. This is misleading. More uranium‐238 does dilute the uranium‐233, but it also results in the production of more plutonium‐239 as the reactor operates. So the proliferation problem remains – either bomb‐usable uranium‐233 or bomb‐usable plutonium is created and can be separated out by reprocessing.

A diagram of this type of reactor ( source):

[backscatter712]

5. Just to start the reaction.

So you only need a small amount.

After that, Uranium 233 is created during the reaction, and keeps it going as it decays. U-233 is nice in that while it's theoretically possible to use it in a weapon, it's usually contaminated with U-232, which is ferociously radioactive. You want to try enriching that stuff to make a bomb? Have fun...

[kristopher]

16. Provide a complete detailed description of the thorium fuel cycle please

A real problem with these discussions is that nuclear proponents pick the best features of several different designs and talk about them as if they are all the same. Of particular interest in that regard is making claims about 30+ year in the future paper reactors that are unproven and untested and then framing those claims around current events based on today's thorium fuel cycles which we KNOW are not superior to uranium.

So please tell us the full fuel cycle and where we can see this fuel cycle in action today.

[backscatter712]

17. What am I, a nuclear engineer?

You want to know all the dirty details, you can learn all about thorium reactors here!

http://energyfromthorium.com/

Lots of smart people discuss these reactors.

I'd say the hardest part is simply coming up with an updated, modern design, which is certainly doable if some nuclear engineers had funding for it. The U.S. gov't operated one back in the 70's, IIRC, that was a proof of concept of the thorium cycle.

[kristopher]

19. You are the one promoting it and You are endorsing a scam.

Take what I wrote as a challenge to whether or not you *should* think this is a good idea. Go to that website you linked and find out precisely what it is that is being promoted. Read with a critical eye, in other words. I gave a couple of links in post 14 that you might enjoy.

[Dead_Parrot]

22. How can you say it's a scam if you don't know the fuel cycle?

I would have thought learning the basics was a requirement before passing judgement.

[kristopher]

27. Why don't you tell everyone what the full fuel cycle is?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=415204

[Dead_Parrot]

28. Try googling "Thorium fuel cycle" if you want to know more

I still don't get how you can claim something is a scam if you don't actually understand it. Divine revalation? Tarot cards? Some guy at a bar told you?

[kristopher]

30. Why are you afraid of sharing the information?

What is the full fuel cycle for thorium and where can we see this fuel cycle in action?

[Dead_Parrot]

31. Kris, I can't actually download a physics degree into your head over the internet

And if you can't google "Thorium fuel cycle" and click the first link, I doubt it would fit anyway. On the other hand, If you want something specific, feel free to ask.

I'll ask you a third time: How can you say it's a scam if you don't understand it?

[kristopher]

32. You can't share it because you don't know?

Or because you know that a full disposition of the facts makes it impossible to conflate all the different technologies that go into the bogus claims the thorium proponents are making?

You promote this technology so by your standards you should be able to provide a step by step breakdown of the full fuel cycle on both sides of the breeder.

Your substitution of personal attacks for key knowledge in noted.

[Dead_Parrot]

33. Interesting...

Either: You don't want to know, and are seeking refuge in ignorance;
or you do want to know, but found too many long words in the wikipedia article and are ashamed to ask for help;
or you already know, but can't find any specific problems and are resorting to obfuscation;
or you really can't google Thorium fuel cycle.

Whichever the answer is, it gives a fascinating glimpse into your mind.

[kristopher]

34. You can't stand to be called on the BS, can you?

It isn't complicated - just post the thorium fuel cycle you claim will solve all of our problems.

I'm not posting it because you guys are pulling from several different technologies and the only way to nail you down is to have you state clearly the specific technology you are making claims about.

It isn't complicated - just post the thorium fuel cycle you claim will solve all of our problems; I won't because such a fuel cycle doesn't exist.

[Dead_Parrot]

35. So...

...Think I'm going with "can't find any specific problems and are resorting to obfuscation". But expect me to pull this thread out next time you mention it.

I'm annoying that way.

[kristopher]

36. The problem is with the false claims

Thorium promoters roll breeder reactors of all types into their arguments trying to sucker people with Sorenson's BS.

You don't want to engage because you KNOW from experience you'll get your clock cleaned when we deal with the nitty-gritty specifics.

[Dead_Parrot]

37. Would that require some nitty-gritty specifics?

'cause I'm not seeing any.

[kristopher]

38. What is the thorium fuel cycle you claim solves all of out nuclear problems?

Sorenson makes a lot of claims - what are the specifics of THE fuel cycle that does all that he is claiming?

It (singular) doesn't exist.

[Dead_Parrot]

40. So, no specific problems.

Thanks for the confirmation.

[Luminous Animal]

39. And that is what Kristopher is asking you to provide in order to engage you in an

intelligent debate.

He is asking which specific fuel cycle are you a proponent? Providing such would give the basis (that is, the nitty-gritty) for discussion.

[Dead_Parrot]

41. I'm a proponent of...

...trying to get kris to explain how he reaches his conclusions. I've never actually succeeded, but it beats watching TV.

[kestrel91316]

8. The U-235 is like a spark plug. And we don't seem to have ANY shortage of it.

Our nuclear bombs could be used for spark plugs, so to speak. A much more appropriate use: dismantle the bombs and repurpose the fuel.

[kristopher]

14. Ask for a full detailed rundown of the "thorium fuel cycle" and all you'll get ...

...will be the sound of crickets.

"Thorium" is the latest PR blitz to keep a dying nuclear industry alive. Sorenson is promoting an undeveloped, unproven technology that - even if it worked as hoped - is thirty years away from deployment. The nuclear revival is falling flat on its face and they need to get public support to keep federal money flowing.
http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/the-end-the-nuclear-renaissance-6325?page=1

MIT's review of nuclear technologies and waste looked at everything out there (including thorium) and this is their conclusion:

"No currently available or reasonably foreseeable reactor and fuel cycle technology developments — including advances in reprocess and recycle technologies — have the potential to fundamentally alter the waste management challenge this nation confronts over at least the next several decades, if not longer,’’ the report said....

This website looks at the technology with a critical eye:

...One other misconception on the internet is the view that a LFTR reactor will produce almost no nuclear waste, as the following You-tube video implies (or see this “activists” banner here). This is not the case. All the while during the plant’s operating life that chemical plant will be producing nuclear waste material, and as discussed earlier some of that is pretty “nasty stuff”. Not a lot of it per day, but it all adds up! Also the supporters of the LFTR seem to assume that this CPP can operate with 100% efficiency (i.e remove all the radioactive poisons). This would be very technically challenging, especially in the LFTR case given the importance about separating out of U-232 (and its Thallium-208 payload) from U-233 or indeed removal of protactinium-233 as well as a host of other nuclear “poisons” discussed. Build up of these in the core both leads to increased irradiation of the core as well as the eventual shutdown of the nuclear reaction process altogether.

An CPP facility capable of that level of operating efficiency would likely be physically very large. Given that it will be working with radioactive materials, and the real radiological hazard is a pipe burst (an all too common occurrence and any chemical plant, and especially likely at these sort of working temperatures and radiation levels), we would thus need to put the CPP underneath our concrete containment dome. Obviously a large CPP will not only be expensive to build and maintain but greatly increase the size of this containment structure, further increasing reactor construction costs as well as increasing construction time (and reducing the number of said reactors we comission in any given time period).

And of course the supporters of the LF reactor concept have yet to come up with a functional design of an CPP. I’ve seen various dusty line drawings of the 1970’s ORNL proposal, you can see them yourself here and here, but that’s it. I would firstly note that materials science and chemical processing technology has moved on hugely in the last 40 years, so I doubt it would be sensible to build an CPP as shown in these plans. A new one would have to be redesigned (all but) from scratch.

The LFTR supporters have tried to counter this by coming up with designs of their own, but I’ve yet to see an actual working schematic, one that specifically discusses cycle efficiencies and above all else ENERGY INPUTS! The designers of this reactor seem to be assuming that this CPP, which will involve various stages of pumping, sparging, vacuum processing and filtering of the working fluid, often at a variety of set temperatures or pressures will operate with no net energy input and achieve 100% separation efficiency! In science we have a technical term for such a belief.

As the working fluid will be ...

http://daryanenergyblog.wordpress.com/ca/part-8-msr-lftr/

[fascisthunter]

15. That's What I Thought

[randr]

6. Back in the late 40's and early 50's when the debate

to pursue either Thorium or Uranium based systems took place the MIC won the debate. Major argument was that they found more military uses for the spent Uranium fuel.
Moving a copy of this tread over to the Environment and Energy forum

[Raine1967]

24. +1

and a K&R for this OP

[HopeHoops]

10. I worked as a human factors engineer in nuclear plants. They're frightening.

The control rooms look like something from the 50's because THEY ARE! It takes so long to get approval for a plant that the concept of updating a design isn't on the table - it would just set the process back by a few years. To prevent a disaster, it is often necessary to turn a dial while reading a meter and pushing a button where all three are ten feet or more away from each other and on other sides of walls. I'm amazed we haven't had more disasters, but putting them on fault lines is about as stupid as you can get.

He's right about the Thorium. Oh, but hey, the military can't use that. I think we've found the root of the problem.

[FarCenter]

13. Are control rooms for Russian, Chinese, Indian and French reactors more modern?

I did find a picture of a control room of a Chinese fast breeder reactor that seemed to be mostly flat panels, keyboard, and mice.

US hasn't built reactors in decades, so of course they are obsolete.

Chinese fast reactor starts supplying electricity
http://www.world-nuclear-news.org/NN-Chinese_fast_reactor_starts_supplying_electricity-2107114.html

[HopeHoops]

20. LOL! They were obsolete when I worked in them and that was 1985.

[FarCenter]

21. Reactor designs in the US date from probably '55 to '75.

Relatively few reactor constructions were started after Three Mile Island.

My recollection is that there was a brief burst of electronic analog computing in the '60s, partly driven by simulators and trainers for nuclear reactor operations.

http://www.cowardstereoview.com/analog/appdym.htm
http://www.cowardstereoview.com/analog/eai.htm

I once used an Applied Dynamics on a non-nuclear project. I think that EAI was the biggest player in nuclear simulators.

[TheWraith]

23. Okay, I have to correct you on a few things.

Uranium plants are big, expensive, require pressurized hot water and steam to work at all, and if there's a pressure loss, or some sort of coolant failure, well, see Fukushima and Chernobyl...

No. Actually it takes a shitload of things going wrong at the same time to create an accident, not just a loss of pressure or coolant.

In the case of Chernobyl, you had:

1. A reactor design with no real containment structure.
2. A complete lack of safety backups.
3. Defective control rods.
4. Incompetent engineers who didn't know the first thing about what they were doing.
5. Incompetent management who didn't know the first thing about what they were doing.
6. And even considering all that, it took an unapproved and ridiculously risky test run during the night shift to actually make the thing explode.

Uranium fuel is inefficient, leaves NASTY waste products, requires infrastructure that's also capable of being retooled to refining uranium into plutonium to make nuclear weapons

"Efficiency" is much misunderstood here. In actuality, 97% of the "waste" is still usable uranium, as long as you're willing to reprocess it. That's what they do in France, which is why France has almost entirely green power with no real nuclear waste problem. Much of the other 3% can be sorted out into isotopes used for radiation therapy or other industrial and medical uses.

Also, there is no requirement to have a nuclear reactor in order to build a nuclear bomb. Highly enriched uranium is just as easy as plutonium and requires no reactor at all.

[GopperStopper2680]

25. To backscatter712

I would like to thank you for posting this article. There's been a lot of hue and cry over nuclear energy since Fukushima but I'm glad to see that someone out there who has an opinion also understands the physics involved. I believe you're quite right-liquid Thorium reactors were primarily shelfed because they can't be used to make weapons. One of my science teachers once told me 'The first thing Man does when he discovers a new technology is investigate it for weapon potential' which is a shame and absolutely true.
With peak oil coming we're going to need new energy sources that offer a long term offset to the problem of generating energy. Coal powered plants are if anything nastier than nuclear plants (they release more radiation directly into the environment in the form of carbon 14) and coal is limited also. I believe systems such as the one you're describing could make a viable replacement AND help us prevent a nuclear armageddon. We call this a 'Two-fer'.
Also, another similar system you may be interested in assuming you haven't looked into it is the Pebblebed Helium Reactor. Though it still uses uranium it's virtually impossible for it to melt down because of the way the fuel is stored. It may be a viable partial step. I believe we should all support this line of research and petition our senators and congressmen to get this technology off the shelf.

[kristopher]

29. That isn't correct.

There are 4 primary problems associated with nuclear power - cost, safety, waste, and proliferation. The thorium fuel cycle does improve things in some areas but it makes things worse in other areas. When evaluated as an overall proposition it is less desirable than the uranium fuel cycle.

You need to think about the claim that it is ignored because of the nuclear weapons aspect. Most of those who build and sell nuclear plants - Korea, France, Japan, Russia and soon China - already have access to all the nuclear weapons materials they need so the claim that they aren't building thorium reactors because they need fissile material for bombs is simply absurd.

That leaves their buyers. The nuclear exporting nations are in keen competition with each other to sell nuclear power plants to developing countries and one of the major obstacles to their market development efforts is the danger of nuclear weapons proliferation that goes hand in hand with nuclear fuel enrichment technology.

Are you saying that the developing nations that are interested in nuclear power would not be interested in thorium because they can't base weapons programs on the technology - that they are actually shopping for nuclear weapons?


I don't see any other way the claim that thorium is ignored because it isn't good for weapons could be interpreted.