Posted on 06/29/2014 7:17:33 AM PDT by ckilmer
A next-generation fast breeder reactor design is gaining popularity in research circles.
On 6 June, UK researchers Jasper Tomlinson and Trevor Griffiths won £75,000 in Technology Strategy Board funding (including £20,000 of contributions-in-kind) to carry out an eight-month feasibility study.
The project, which will be managed by mechanical engineer Rory O'Sullivan, aims to develop a ranking of alternatives and configurations of a liquid-fuelled molten-salt reactor, including costs, regulatory, public acceptance and site issues for building and licensing a pilot-scale demonstration reactor in the UK. It would aim to prepare the ground for a full engineering design for the chosen option, to present to potential investors.
"There isn't an MSR currently operating anywhere. If people could look at one, their conception of nuclear power would entirely alter. They are nothing like the present PWR setup. They are so extraordinarily different. That is what we are trying to do," says Jasper Tomlinson, whose small business Energy Process Developments will be carrying out the work starting in September at the earliest, subject to signing a contract.
The Alvin Weinberg Foundation is a London-based charity advocating for Gen IV reactors and thorium fuel, lists seven current international MSR projects: Ian Scott's Moltex project in the UK, Elsa Merle-Lecotte's EVOL project in France, the US Transatomic Power project, David LeBlanc's Terrestrial Energy project in Canada, Kirk Sorensen's Flibe Energy project in the USA, Motoyasu Kinoshita's Fuji Reactor project in Japan, and Hongjie Xu's MSR Project in China.
On 19 May Atkins nuclear technical director, Paul Littler, and consultant Barry Snelson gave a lecture in Warrington entitled, 'Fission's future: Molten Salt Reactors - can they be the answer?'
In the talk, Littler said that there are some 18 different varieties of MSR. All use fuel in molten form; the salt consists of a chemical solution mixture of actinides, thorium, plutonium and uranium as halides. Temperatures are up to 800°C, so significantly hotter than LWRs, but because salts' boiling points are almost double that (1400°C) a pressurised primary system is not required.
According to the Weinberg foundation, MSRs have several benefits over current LWRs: molten fuel allows 30 times greater burnup than solid fuel, eliminates the risk of LOCAs since the coolant is also the fuel, and the molten salt fuel is not chemically reactive, so the fuel simply solidifies if it leaks out.
Littler of Atkins said that the reactor also allows the breeding of uranium from fertile thorium, which is three times more abundant than uranium in the earth, and in terms of fuel-grade deposits is perhaps 100 times more abundant.
Littler said that MSRs could fill the gap between the end of the current generation of nuclear reactors and the development of commercial fusion power, and start up about 2050.
molten salt reactors would cut the cost of electricity to 1/4-1/10 the current lowest cost coal produced electricity . This would make electricity for electric cars cheap but it would also make it cheap to do in situ mining for oil shale in the green river basin and thereby take the cost of oil shale production from the $80@ barrel range to the $40@ barrel range.
whats the “15 minutes of fame” all about?
that implies the idea came and went in short order. i don’t think thats what the article meant to say. the idea is still viable?
We are so burdened with regulation, second-guessing, and government interference.
Why should it take 35 YEARS to develop this technology. We put a man on the moon in less than 10 years. We developed a nuclear bomb in half that. 35 years we went from the first personal computer to computers in every last thing on the planet.
But it will take 35 years to develop something based on well-understood physics?
They were talking about this 2 years ago. Why don’t we have a test bed running today? Or do we?
They should repair the FFTF and crank that baby up again.
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast_Flux_Test_Facility<
I think what the author meant to convey was that Thorium Reactors are currently in the ‘limelight’.
Since it is the UK, maybe that would be ‘limeylight’.
“: )
Or did we?
(answer is yes, per above post)
I’m sold, the passive shutdown sold me the rest is just gravy. I will however google to see if there is a downside.
Makes sense.
That’s funny and true.
I'll save you the time.
The downside is that it would put the current 'green' energy projects in jeopardy, and risk the fortunes of the corrupt ruling elite.
That is why it was shut down the first time it was tried.
(don't tell anybody but it was started 35 years ago)
...and according to the USGS weighs in at 3 Trillion Barrels.
I recall that the US Navy equipped a submarine with an experimental liquid sodium reactor back in the 1950s.
Actually because it creates no plutonium byproducts, and the military dominated the decision-making process at that time.
Bump for later.
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