TUESDAY, DECEMBER 7, 2010
Missouri, Rare Earths and Thorium (Bit Tooth Energy)
I attended a small conference in Missouri yesterday that was initially devoted to the study of Thorium Reactors. This is not a subject that I have been paying a lot of attention to, although it has been a more popular topic of discussion in recent months that it has been in a number of years. It was, however, the less evident side of that discussion that brought me to the meeting.
There are a number of talks on Liquid Salt Reactors from much more qualified folk than I available on such channels as Youtubethat go into much more detail than is currently necessary here. There is an ongoing program to develop the next generation of nuclear reactors (the Generation IV Reactors), and the use of amolten salt, thorium-fueled reactor has been one of the candidates that has emerged from this evaluation. There are a number of advantages to the use of this system, one coming from the lower pressure at which the system operates and the other, which was repeatedly stressed yesterday, is that it is not practically possible to make weapons-grade nuclear warheads from any of the system components once the reactor is started. Another point made was of the small amount of thorium that would be needed to supply a person’s energy needs. A 3-ft balloon was used to signify the amount of coal a person needs for energy in a week, a pea would symbolize the amount of uranium needed to provide the same amount of energy but for a month, and a few grains of salt the amount of thorium needed to provide that same energy for a month. A cube 32 mm on the side (1-1/4 inches) was said to have enough energy for a person’s lifetime.
There are a number of talks on Liquid Salt Reactors from much more qualified folk than I available on such channels as Youtubethat go into much more detail than is currently necessary here. There is an ongoing program to develop the next generation of nuclear reactors (the Generation IV Reactors), and the use of amolten salt, thorium-fueled reactor has been one of the candidates that has emerged from this evaluation. There are a number of advantages to the use of this system, one coming from the lower pressure at which the system operates and the other, which was repeatedly stressed yesterday, is that it is not practically possible to make weapons-grade nuclear warheads from any of the system components once the reactor is started. Another point made was of the small amount of thorium that would be needed to supply a person’s energy needs. A 3-ft balloon was used to signify the amount of coal a person needs for energy in a week, a pea would symbolize the amount of uranium needed to provide the same amount of energy but for a month, and a few grains of salt the amount of thorium needed to provide that same energy for a month. A cube 32 mm on the side (1-1/4 inches) was said to have enough energy for a person’s lifetime.
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