
A Thorium-Salt Reactor Has Fired Up for the First Time in Four Decades - jseliger
http://www.thoriumenergyworld.com/news/finally-worlds-first-tmsr-experiment-in-over-40-years-started
======
philipkglass
Better explanation here (linked from Technology Review):
[http://www.thoriumenergyworld.com/news/finally-worlds-
first-...](http://www.thoriumenergyworld.com/news/finally-worlds-first-tmsr-
experiment-in-over-40-years-started)

More details on the experiment sequence:
[https://public.ornl.gov/conferences/MSR2016/docs/Presentatio...](https://public.ornl.gov/conferences/MSR2016/docs/Presentations/MSR2016-day1-17-Ralph-
Hania-The-SALIENT-Fluoride-Fuel-Salt-Irradiations.pdf)

This is not actually a reactor test because the thorium-bearing salt does not
attain criticality. It's a sequence of materials tests using thorium-
containing salt mixtures in small crucibles inside the conventionally fueled
High Flux Reactor ([https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/en/research-facility/high-flux-
reac...](https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/en/research-facility/high-flux-reactor)).

The experiments rely on neutrons from the High Flux Reactor to induce nuclear
reactions in the thorium-bearing salt mixtures. However, the experiments will
be useful in validating materials behavior for possible future molten salt
reactors because it combines realistic thermal, chemical, and radiation
stresses.

~~~
didgeoridoo
Comments like this are why I don't bother getting my tech & science news from
anywhere but HN.

~~~
bduerst
I've seen an increase in the number of NLP bots that give snippets, but
they're far from consistently being accurate. Are there any services that can
give you summations like this, kind of like the WSJ's _What 's News_ section?

~~~
wtallis
Sometimes, the best summary is "this article is bunk". You won't get that from
a bot. The fatal flaws in bad journalism are too often subtle and require
careful parsing or outside knowledge to identify.

~~~
pas
I think it's easily quantifiable what's a good article. Clear statement at the
top that refers to big things, not a storytelling bullshit opening, then the
body of the article provides support for that top statement, and later
portions are basically just more of the same gradually unfolding sub-articles.

If this structure is lacking, it'll be obvious to sentiment analysis, that
there are too much free floating statement, and the article either requires
too much outside knowledge (in field expertise), or it's just gossip.

And of course it can be "easily" estimated how novel the statement is, what
quality the sources and support are, and so on.

------
Sukotto
I think we're making a serious PR mistake calling these "Thorium Reactors"
even though the term is accurate.

"Reactor" evokes "Nuclear Reactor". For many people, "nuclear reactor" is a
deeply loaded term. Likewise "Thorium" (and other words that end in "-ium")
sounds dangerously like "plutonium" and "uranium".

It doesn't _matter_ how much better/safer this technology is. Don't expect the
public to respond positively when we use those words. There's too much knee
jerk, "no nukes!" baggage.

We should start calling these "salt power stations" or something else
_accurate, yet non-threatening_. Otherwise, IMHO, it will be a steep uphill
battle getting public and legislative support for building these things,
_regardless_ of their many benefits.

~~~
acidburnNSA
A bunch of people have tried to rebrand our most energy-dense fuels (uranium
and thorium). "Terrestrial Energy" comes to mind. And the unofficial Thorium
PR lead, Kirk Sorensen, rebranded the Thorium-Molten Salt Reactor (T-MSR) as
the LFTR (Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor) because "lifter" sounds better. As
an engineer I'm a stickler on accurate naming so this suggestion bothers me,
and I think the opposing forces will easily be able to point out that it's
just a rebranding of advanced nuclear reactors and hurt proponents'
credibility. I wish we could just teach people to weigh risks of things like
nuclear reactors versus their real benefits (clean air that has saved 1.8
million people already, 24/7 reliability, tiny land/fuel/waste/transportation
footprints, etc.) but on the other hand people are more emotional than not.
I'm sure you're right that a sweet new name on a nuclear reactor would be a
help.

Honestly I consider focus on Thorium fuel itself to be an attempt to rebrand
the much broader but equally capable advanced nuclear industry.

~~~
snarfy
Unfortunately regardless of what you wish, people do not weigh the risks. They
have knee jerk reactions to terms like 'nuclear reactor'. It's human nature
and shouldn't be ignored. Is it more important that it have an accurate name
or that it's accepted by the public?

~~~
acidburnNSA
Definitely the latter. I just hope to find other ways to influence people's
feelings about things like nuclear reactors. If some epic rebranding is what
it takes, then that's great. I feel that it will take more than that.

~~~
philipkglass
Any such rebranding would probably last about as long as it takes people to
learn that the facilities are built by nuclear contractors, regulated by the
NRC, and employing nuclear operators.

~~~
bonesss
More importantly: any such rebranding would ignore how we got into the current
predicament to begin with...

Oil, gas, and coal companies have known about climate change for decades, and
it represents a threat to untold megabillions worth of profits and business.
It is no coincidence they have been pushing anti-nuclear FUD, sponsoring hack
research, pushing "green" blogs, NIMBY campaigns, and such for decades.
Coordinated, professional, smear campaigns masquerading as environmental
issues.

Leaked presentations and marketing materials have shown those companies have
triangulated the issue quite simply: They cannot win on facts. They cannot
convince everyone to keep fossil fueling it up on the merits of their
argument. They can, however, cause enough confusion and knee-jerking to keep
the "debate" about climate change open to paralyze political action. They have
also pushed pie-in-the-sky green solutions which are superficially satisfying
but fundamentally entrench their interests until we're past the point of no
return. Push the starting line so far forward that we just have to give up.

That the "environmentalists" on the left have spent 20+ years pushing the
strategic interests of Big Coal and Big Oil using their resources and bad
science is the result of willful manipulation. That manipulation is a response
to the threat of atomic energy and climate change legislation in light of our
global infrastructure cycles.

That is to say: if you call fission "grandmas apple pie" it will be a very
short time before we're all convinced that grandmas apple pie is dangerous,
impractical, too expensive, poorly thought out, not scalable, not feasible,
and impossible to do right. Forget what the stats say. Do not look at Ontario.
Pretend France is not real. There will be blogs. There will be glossy signs.
There will be "grassroots activism", tweet campaigns, and coordinated
messaging about Big Grandma and the cancerous properties of Pie. The anti-GMO
people will now be anti-grandma, too.

We are playing a game against well-connected oligopolists... We only get to
win if we win. They get to win if they win, or if the clock runs out. So guess
what the strategy is?

~~~
mathw
It's all quite baffling, because they could instead of invested some of those
megabillions in extending their reach into low-carbon energy sources,
embracing the new world and continuing to exist.

~~~
vertex-four
The thing is, the _reason_ they have those megabillions and continue to make
money is the institutional knowledge they have of how to run a mature business
in the industry they're in. Parts of that will translate over to nuclear power
or whatever comes next, but for a very significant chunk of it, they're
competing with every other business in the new industry, many of which will
have a lot less baggage - which is incredibly risky.

------
ChuckMcM
A couple of comments;

First it is really awesome to see actual research experiments being done on
the materials. This is a critical first step in understanding the underlying
complexity of the problems and as the article points out it is really helpful
to have a regulatory agency that is open to trying new things.

The second is this isn't a 'Thorium-Salt Reactor' it is 'parts that would go
into parts that would make up such a reactor if the experiments indicate they
will work.' A much less clickbaitey headline but such is 21st century
journalism.

~~~
xaldir
The second is very important, there is still a lot of research and engineering
to have:

* a (ideally several) functioning research reactor

* an industrial prototype

* and finally a fully functional commercial plant

It's a step in the right direction, but the road is very long.

------
PaulHoule
I am surprised they are using stainless steel instead of Hastelloy-N

[http://www.haynesintl.com/alloys/alloy-
portfolio_/Corrosion-...](http://www.haynesintl.com/alloys/alloy-
portfolio_/Corrosion-Resistant-Alloys/hastelloy-n-alloy/principle-features)

The Hastelloy family of super alloys is basically stainless steel without the
steel and was proven in the Oak Ridge MSR experiment.

~~~
topspin
Oak Ridge MSRE found unexpected cracking throughout the reactor anywhere
Hastelloy came into contact with the salt fuel. Experiments produced various
means of reducing the cracking, but it is not exactly true to characterize
this system as "proven."

In 1977 Oak Ridge concluded [1]:

    
    
        Controlling the oxidation potential of the salt coupled with the
        presence of chromium ions in the salt appears to be an effective means
        of limiting tellurium embrittlement of Hastelloy N. However, further
        studies are needed to assess the effects of longer exposure times and
        to measure the interaction parameters for chromium and tellurium under
        varying salt oxidation potentials.
    

We know that without very precise control of the salt fuel chemistry Hastalloy
N. will become brittle. It's an open question what happens with longer
exposure. And that is where it was left by MSRE.

[1] [http://moltensalt.org.s3-website-us-
east-1.amazonaws.com/ref...](http://moltensalt.org.s3-website-us-
east-1.amazonaws.com/references/static/downloads/pdf/ORNL-TM-6002.pdf)

~~~
PaulHoule
To be fair, the same is true of the LWR.

------
velodrome
This technology, if viable, could help solve our current nuclear waste
problem. Valuable materials could be recycled (by separation) for additional
use.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_reprocessing#Pyroproce...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_reprocessing#Pyroprocessing)

[https://youtu.be/oAVCaUonrbE?t=12m7s](https://youtu.be/oAVCaUonrbE?t=12m7s)

~~~
NinoScript
I wasn't expecting to see George Lucas on that video, I kinda got distracted
because of him.

------
skybrian
This was apparently at the High Flux Reactor in Petten, Netherlands.

[https://articles.thmsr.nl/petten-has-started-world-s-
first-t...](https://articles.thmsr.nl/petten-has-started-world-s-first-
thorium-msr-specific-irradiation-experiments-in-45-years-ff8351fce5d2)

------
ece
India has the most thorium reserves, according to USGS:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occurrence_of_thorium](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occurrence_of_thorium)

And they have had the plans and motivation to build domestic reactors for the
past two decades: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/India%27s_three-
stage_nuclear_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/India%27s_three-
stage_nuclear_power_programme#Stage_III_.E2.80.93_Thorium_Based_Reactors)

NSG membership keeps getting held up by someone or the other and would provide
more energy security for India.

[http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/nuclear-reactor-
at-...](http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/nuclear-reactor-at-kalpakkam-
worlds-envy-indias-pride/articleshow/59407602.cms)

~~~
knowThySelfx
India's Thorium rich sands are being mined and exported. Not many people are
aware though. Hope it isn't too late. Scandals have throttled many efforts to
grow indigenous techs. The ridiculous ISRO spy case is one such example. Cui
bono?

~~~
ece
Cui bono indeed. Corruption benefits. I don't think the spy case affected much
of anything.

~~~
knowThySelfx
It did affect our Cryogenic initiatives. Nambi Narayanan was the main brain
behind it. It was a setback from scientific point of view for ISRO.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nambi_Narayanan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nambi_Narayanan)

Looking at the wiki, it seems likely that outside forces might've been
involved in the scandal.

------
dabockster
> charged particles traveling faster than the speed of light in water

What did I just read?

~~~
toufka
Cherenkov Radiation [1]. It's not because the particles are going faster than
300M m/s, but because light _in the medium_ is going less than 300M m/s. The
unbreakable "speed of light" is actually, the "speed of light (in a vacuum)".
Outside of a vacuum, the light is slowed by the materials it travels through
(see prisms, angles of refraction, Snell's Law [2] etc.). But it's still a
very special condition when the medium slows light to some large fraction of
C, while particles are going _faster_ than that (but still less than C).

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherenkov_radiation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherenkov_radiation)

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snell%27s_law](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snell%27s_law)

~~~
Florin_Andrei
Yup. Whenever you see that blue glow surrounding a reactor core submerged in
water, that's the Cherenkov radiation.

If the blue glow happens in your own eyeballs, you've probably just witnessed
your own death sentence.

~~~
pitaj
It is dangerous? Nuclear subs have cherenkov radiation outside the hull which
implies they have it inside the hull as well, but you don't hear about sailors
getting radiation poisoning all the time.

------
jhallenworld
So there was a meltdown at a liquid sodium cooled reactor due to a materials
problem:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_Reactor_Experiment](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_Reactor_Experiment)

I don't see a pump seal test in this experiment... does anyone know if a
solution to the SRE meltdown problem is known at this point? Perhaps the LFT
chemistry would not have the issue.

~~~
foxyv
This isn't a sodium cooled reactor, in this case the molten salt is the fuel
itself, not the coolant. Plus there is probably no sodium involved but instead
a fluoridated nuclear fuel such as thorium or uranium. Also this is a sub-
critical experiment so pretty much all they have to do is turn it off if it
overheats.

The best part of a molten salt fueled reactor is that in case of heat runaway
the fuel would melt plugs and drain into separate containers. Essentially a
meltdown would only require replacement of the plugs and refueling of the
reactor to make it operational again.

------
bhhaskin
Really happy to finally see some movement with Thorium. It might not be the
magic silver bullet that some people hype it up to be, but it needs to be
explored.

------
acidburnNSA
Glad to see some thorium-bearing salt being irradiated in a conventionally-
fueled test reactor. That's a big step to getting back on the road to fluid-
fueled reactors.

Here are some reminders for everyone on the technical info about Thorium.
First of all, Thorium is found in nature as a single isotope, Th-232, which is
__fertile __like Uranium-238 (not __fissile __like U-235 or Plutonium-239).
This means that you have to irradiate it first (using conventional fuel).
Th-232 absorbs a neutron and becomes Protactinium-233, which naturally decays
to Uranium-233, a fissile nuclide and good nuclear fuel. This is called
breeding. Thorium is unique in that it can breed more fuel than it consumes
using slow neutrons, whereas the Uranium-Plutonium breeder cycles require fast
neutrons (which in turn require highly radiation-resistant materials, higher
fissile inventory, and moderately exotic coolants like sodium metal or high-
pressure gas). Any kind of breeder reactor (Th-U or U-Pu) can provide world-
scale energy for hundreds of thousands of years using known resources and
billions of years using uranium dissolved in seawater (not yet economical).

Great, so Thorium can do thermal breeding, so what? Well to actually breed in
slow neutrons, you have to continuously remove neutron-absorbing fission
products as they're created (lest they spoil the chain reaction), so you
really can only do this with __fluid fuel __. This leads to an interesting
reactor design called the Molten Salt Reactor (MSR). Fun facts about this kind
of reactor are that it can run at high temperatures (for process heat /thermal
efficiency), can run continuously (high capacity factor), is passively safe
(can shut down and cool itself without external power or human intervention in
accident scenarios), and doesn't require precision fuel fabrication. Downsides
are that the radionuclides (including radioactive volatiles) are not contained
in little pins and cans like in solid fueled reactors so you get radiation all
over your pumps, your heat exchangers, and your reactor vessel. This is a
solvable radiological containment issue (use good seals and double-walled
vessels) but is a challenge (the MSRE in the 1960s lost almost half of its
iodine; no one knows where it went!!)

U-Pu fuel can work in MSRs as well, getting those nice safety benefits, but it
can't breed unless you have fast neutrons.

People on the internet may tell you that Thorium can't be used to make bombs
and that it's extremely cheap, etc. These are not necessarily true. You can
make bombs with a Th-U fuel cycle (just separate the Pa-233 before it decays),
and nuclear system costs are unknown until you build and operate a few. There
are reasons to hope it could be cheaper due to simplicity, but there are major
additional complexities over traditional plants or other advanced reactors in
the chemistry department that add a lot of uncertainty. Fluid fueled reactors
are probably ~100x or more safer than traditional water-cooled reactors, on
par with sodium-cooled fast reactors and other Gen-IV concepts with passive
decay heat removal capabilities.

------
zython
I was under the impression that thorium-salt reactors have been tried in the
past and not deemed "worth" from security and profitability point of view.

What has changed about that ?

~~~
ChuckMcM
They have different problems that pressured water reactors and are not as
applicable to applications that the military would like to use them for. So
the government sponsored research labs that were running and experimenting
with them stopped doing so when research funds ran out.

Add to the insane risk of investing in anything 'nuclear' and you don't have a
lot of available capital. That said, the Chinese who invest in research for
other reasons seem to have been working on a number of MSRs which could
conceivably advance the state of the art significantly.

Oddly enough, as an American, I am looking forward to the first thing that
China builds that "we" American's cannot because we lack expertise and/or
technology to do so.

~~~
phkahler
>> Oddly enough, as an American, I am looking forward to the first thing that
China builds that "we" American's cannot because we lack expertise and/or
technology to do so.

Or too much regulation or politics to allow.

~~~
ChuckMcM
Exactly right. The one that came in conversation waiting for the eclipse was
genetic editing of fetuses to eliminate inherited disease. Setting aside the
whole 'designer babies' as a distraction imagine a company that give free
genetic treatment for couples seeking to avoid passing on known bad genes.
When you walk that forward and look at the cost associated with treating,
diagnosing, and supporting people that later get the disease, you begin to see
a huge economic 'win' by giving them free genetic help early.

~~~
troygoode
Why would you expect that treatment to be free?

~~~
theptip
If the cost of editing is not exorbitant (i.e. is lower than the average per-
capita cost of paying for the condition being edited away), healthcare
providers would be incentivized to pay for the editing to reduce their costs.

The incentives are obviously stronger in single-payer countries, but even in
the US you could imagine an insurance company that competed on lower premiums
conditional upon certain gene edits being applied to covered children.

~~~
chrisallenlane
> in the US you could imagine an insurance company that competed on lower
> premiums conditional upon certain gene edits being applied to covered
> children.

On one hand, this sounds entirely economically reasonable (and even
humanitarian).

On the other hand, I fear this would inevitably produce unintended
consequences that would shape our society in distopian, sci-fi/horror-flavored
ways.

I have no idea how it would actually shake out. Maybe I'm just being anti-
intellectual here.

~~~
candiodari
Given the economics, I feel pretty confident predicting that these edits will
be mandatory before most people on this site die.

~~~
adrianN
At least you'd probably have to pay a lot more of the bills if you chose not
to have genetic problems corrected before birth.

------
tfy11aro
Support the exciting development:

[https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?redirect_uri=http%3A%2F%2Fw...](https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?redirect_uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.thoriumenergyworld.com%2Fnews%2Ffinally-
worlds-first-tmsr-experiment-in-over-40-years-
started&u=5771623&utm_medium=widget)

~~~
AndreasFling
I'm already a Thorium Patron, proud to be part of this!

------
xupybd
"The inside of the Petten test reactor where the thorium salt is being tested
is shining due to charged particles traveling faster than the speed of light
in water."

What I thought that wasn't possible? Or is this just the speed of light in
water, so the particles are still moving slower than the speed of light in a
vacuum?

~~~
tomr_stargazer
> What I thought that wasn't possible? Or is this just the speed of light in
> water, so the particles are still moving slower than the speed of light in a
> vacuum?

Good question! It's the latter - the shining is due to Cherenkov radiation
[0], "electromagnetic radiation emitted when a charged particle (such as an
electron) passes through a dielectric medium at a speed greater than the phase
velocity of light in that medium."

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherenkov_radiation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherenkov_radiation)

------
tim333
Glad to see they are resuming research even though there remain problems with
it as a commercial technology.

~~~
mdekkers
_even though there remain problems with it as a commercial technology_

Such as...?

~~~
tim333
There are quite a few issues which this site goes into quite well
[https://whatisnuclear.com/articles/thorium.html](https://whatisnuclear.com/articles/thorium.html)

Basically you can make reactors using it but it would probably work out more
expensive than conventional ones.

------
nate908
What's up with this image caption?

"The inside of the Petten test reactor where the thorium salt is being tested
is shining due to charged particles traveling faster than the speed of light
in water."

As I understand it, nothing travels faster than the speed of light. The author
is mistaken, right?

~~~
lutorm
No, it's correct. The key is the "... in water" part.

~~~
mikeash
For details, see:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherenkov_radiation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherenkov_radiation)

------
novalis78
Great that they are mentioning ThorCon's project in Indonesia. Too bad that
they had to leave the US after trying really hard to find a way to build it
here.

------
zmix
As far as I know the Chinese are also putting much effort into this type of
reactor.

~~~
rosege
Thats what I heard too a couple of years ago - they were putting huge amounts
of money into Thorium research - does anyone know how far they are away from
something similar?

------
genzoman
very excited about this tech, but i think it will be regulated to death.

~~~
tossandturn
You are aware of the current U.S. President and the current EPA Administrator,
right?

~~~
davrosthedalek
Not so sure about that. Might risk these billions of coal jobs he created...

~~~
PaulHoule
Also those two do not believe in global warming. (One thing nuclear does not
cause)

It make take a long time for thorium reactors to come online but it is hard to
believe anybody is going to fund the construction of a new large LWR anywhere
outside China.

~~~
mschuster91
> (One thing nuclear does not cause)

However, two problems remain:

1) where to get the raw material? African mines are not exactly known for
adhering to human or environmental rights, also African mines, by nature of
being in Africa, don't create American jobs. Same is valid for the other major
sources of nuclear fuel, all of which aren't the USA.

2) where to dump all the nuclear waste? I mean, people have debated to put in
the most long-living and nasty stuff into special reactors to get it split up
to less harmful stuff, but to my knowledge this has never been realized - and
NIMBYs are highly afraid of a rad-waste dump near their houses, across the
world. Also, no one has shown how to build something that can last over ten
thousands of years while still protecting the rad waste.

~~~
PaulHoule
The use of thorium in the MSR is perhaps 30x more fuel efficient than the
current light water reactor. Large amounts of thorium have been buried in the
desert by the U.S. government. Also, sufficient deposits exist in the U.S. to
support centuries of use.

As for nuclear waste, the real reason why the problem appears intractable is
that nuclear waste is not waste.

The LWR gets only 2% or so of the energy in uranium, the same fuel could be
reprocessed and used in fast breeder reactors to release the other 98%. In
fact, it is the presence of plutonium and other actinides in spent fuel that
requires environmental isolation beyond 500 years or so. If we use those
actinides as fuel, they do not need to be buried, and if we do that, the
volume of waste is vastly reduced along with the half-life.

The fast breeder/reprocessing route has not been commercialized as of yet for
a number of reasons. Probably the most discussed is that plutonium, neptunium
and other actinides useful for nuclear weaponry could be nicked from the
reprocessing plant.

The thorium MSR is an alternate path to a breeder, aka a "thermal breeder". In
the case of the MSR, the reprocessing is done online or nearline to the
reactor. It is also possible to do thermal breeding with thorium with a
modified version of the light water reactor. Reprocessing that is a bitch
though...

The most immediate problem facing the industry is an inability to say "it is
going to take X years and Y dollars to build a reactor" and then finish it
somewhere near on schedule and on budget. Being over 10% would be no scandal,
but it is still looking more like 10x than 10%.

~~~
ornel
Doesn't reprocessing produce a lot of high level waste as a byproduct, thereby
worsening the waste problem?

And I understand the Japanese had an experimental breeder reactor for a long
time and never achieved actually producing any commercially viable
electricity. They did get lots of plutonium, though, which may be turned into
bombs any moment.

~~~
PaulHoule
Early on the fission products were stored in acid solutions in tanks. Circa
1980 the technology was developed to evaporate the solution and trap the
fission products inside glass.

Plutonium from either a LWR or FBR fuel cycle is heavily contaminated with
isotopes that will cause a bomb to predetonate or get really hot. Somebody
with advanced technology (say Japan's government) could probably use
electromagnetic separation to remove the unwanted isotopes, but you wouldn't
expect ISIS to be able to do it.

The real thing terrorists would want to nick from a reprocessing plant is
Neptunium 237; it has a large critical mass compared to plutonium, but it can
be separated by chemical means and will not predetonate.

In the 1970s people wrote hang-wringing papers wondering if inventory control
could be made good enough to detect diversion, a 2000s accident at
Sellafield's THORP plant showed that it probably can't. They lost an Olymptic
size swimming pool worth of fluid containing upwards of 50kg of Pu and around
1000kg of U and did not notice for months.

To be fair, it drained into a containment area and did not threaten anyone.
They were able to clean it up. But obviously the inventory control was
nonexistent.

THORP has been successful at producing plutonium oxide powder but the UK was
unable to fabricate it into fuel elements and had to ship it to France.

------
MentallyRetired
How'd you like to be the guy pressing the button for 40 years?

------
unlmtd1
I have a better idea: horsecarts and sailships.

------
SubiculumCode
Anyone with insight on this I read years ago:
[http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/energy/a11907/is-
the...](http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/energy/a11907/is-the-
superfuel-thorium-riskier-than-we-thought-14821644/)

I worry that that if Thorium reactors become very very common because they are
thought to be very safe (e.g. behind your house common, as some have bragged),
but they turn out to be dangerous...we will have a real problem.

~~~
jopsen
I think it's unlikely that we'll want to have people playing with radio active
waste in their backyard..

We have decent electricity grids, if reactors become financially viable, first
goal will be to power the grid.

I don't see any profit margin in decentralizing the grid.

