
Thorium, the New Green Nuke - unignorant
http://www.wired.com/magazine/2009/12/ff_new_nukes/
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teilo
Finally this is getting attention! The politics of nuclear energy are so
messed up that thorium reactor technology got buried under radioactive piles
of propaganda, because, you know, if it's nuclear it must be bad.

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electromagnetic
It's due noting that India didn't ignore Thorium, holding 25% of the worlds
reserve it saw well in advance that Th232 has a half-life as long as the known
universe and gives the country energy independence. With current estimates,
India essentially holds as much energy in its thorium reserves as the world
has uranium reserves, meaning it itself could sell enough energy to likely run
the world for 100 years, or run itself (at present demand) into the next
millennium without a concern.

The US is presently worrying about where to find its energy independence,
while India has already found its independence for the next 1,000 years.

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Locke1689
I'm not sure where you got the 25% number, but thorium deposits exist all over
the world. In the US, the carolinas are an available source. It's about as
common as lead, so i'm not really sure we're predicting any shortages anywhere
yet.

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jawad
The USGS Minerals Commodity Summary for Thorium indicates that Australia, the
US, India, and Norway have 80% of the world's thorium reserve base.

PDF warning:
[http://minerals.usgs.gov/minerals/pubs/commodity/thorium/mcs...](http://minerals.usgs.gov/minerals/pubs/commodity/thorium/mcs-2009-thori.pdf)

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Locke1689
Thanks. Interestingly enough it seems that Australia, not India, is the winner
in Thorium reserves, both economically exploitable and total. In total, the US
and India have equivalent reserves, while India has more economically
exploitable.

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mrduncan
The Wikipedia article for Thorium as a fuel is surprisingly detailed:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thorium_fuel_cycle>

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ggrot
This is also a great video (google talk) about the technology:
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWUeBSoEnRk&sn](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWUeBSoEnRk&sn)
\- shortened to 16 minutes, very well worth watching.

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jbrun
A little fast paced, but very good stuff, thanks. Do you know of any more in-
depth videos on Thorium reactors?

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mquander
"Fuel input per gigawatt output: 250 tons raw uranium?"

Come on, Wired. 250 tons is a quantity, and gigawatt is a rate. Is it supposed
to be a gigawatt times the lifetime of the plant?

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pieter
it's probably 250 tons / year for a 1 gigawatt plant

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jedc
Probably not... re-fueling is a very time-intensive process. (The reactors I
worked on were designed to be re-fueled every 25-30 years.)

250 tons for a 1 gigawatt constant output seems more likely to me.

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sketerpot
I can clarify this. It's 250 tonnes of raw uranium, from which we get 35
tonnes of 3% enriched uranium, which give one gigawatt-year of electricity in
a typical light water reactor.

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gcv
Anyone interested in doing a startup which could help push thorium energy
forward? I know and understand nothing about physics, but maybe there's room
for programmers to carve out their niche in something useful here.

Energy is the biggest problem humans face today.

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zitterbewegung
You would probably require a ridiculous amount of VC funding to even make a
plant. Also, you are competing with people with PhD's in the field doing
research.

~~~
gcv
_competing with people with PhDs_

Yes. This is the tragedy of programming and computer "science": you know
everything about making tools and writing code to other people's specs — and
nearly nothing about solving actual real-world problems. That's why I
mentioned carving out a niche. I didn't intend to build a whole plant, but a
company which comes up with software which helps people building plants might
have a fighting chance.

~~~
Locke1689
Sounds like a solutions searching for a problem. Let's wait for the US to
decide to build q new reactor first.

You would also probably require experience writing real-time, fail-safe
systems (like vxWorks) and a very high government security clearance.

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ams6110
I wonder how many wind/solar/bio energy proponents are even aware of this.

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lutorm
I remember listening to a talk by ex-CERN director Carlo Rubbia pushing
accelerator-driven Th reactors sometime in the early 90s.

It's not new. Maybe it's the Betamax of nuclear technology... ;-)

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bg4
Interesting. Just a few days ago a friend sent me a link to a site he's
involved with on this subject. www.thoriumenergyalliance.com

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xal
This is fascinating. A left of field approach to the problems of uranium based
nuclear power. Let's hope that opportunity meets preparedness here and this
can make it to an inflection point.

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MikeCapone
Another good source of information about Thorium:

<http://thoriumenergy.blogspot.com/>

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InclinedPlane
This article is a little bit silly in the way it portrays Thorium reactors as
being pushed aside for only a few reasons. Even aside from the nuclear weapons
angle (quite important during the cold war) in 1973 Uranium/Plutonium reactor
technology was vastly more mature than Thorium reactor technology (that is
still true today). When the choice is between funding a well-known nth
generation commercial reactor design (using Uranium) and sinking unknown
quantities of R&D dollars into a program to develop a commercial reactor
design (using Thorium) the choice is obvious.

We should probably be investing considerably more money into Thorium reactor
designs (though the same applies for Uranium reactor designs as well), but the
picture this article portrays of a more worthy underdog being sidelined for
petty reasons is very misleading.

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helyxzion
Thorium is the fuel of the future. Thorium is safe to handle. Thorium energy
technology is totally emissions free! Thorium has an energy density of 292
time that of Hydrogen. One gram of thorium is equal to 20 million grams of
coal or 7350 gallons of gasoline.

