Posted on 05/22/2011 6:04:55 PM PDT by neverdem
Now, following the release of radioactive material at the Fukushima plant in Japan, activists around the world threaten to eliminate nuclear power as an acceptable energy source. However, before governments indulge that knee-jerk response, they should consider the tremendous benefits of TFR.
The fuel is in the form of a fluoride salt with a melting temperature of approximately 600 degrees Fahrenheit. Because the system is not pressurized, any reactor breach leading to a release of fuel would be driven only by gravity. Thus, the fluoride salt, instead of being blown into the atmosphere, would cool and solidify. Hazardous radioactive material would be frozen into place in the shape of easily cleanable salt crystals.
To further guard against a catastrophic release of radioactive material, the TFR is designed to have fuel added and radioactive fission products (nuclear waste) removed on a continual basis. The fission products, therefore, do not concentrate within the fuel. This prevents the reactor from containing an excess of fuel reactivity at any given time. The most problematic waste products are gases, such as iodine and xenon, but the continual elimination of these gases and other radioactive fission products effectively eliminates the potential for catastrophe.
Additionally, far less radioactive material is needed to operate a TFR plant. Whereas conventional uranium plants create 35 gigawatt-hours of electricity per metric ton of uranium, TFR creates 11,000 gigawatt-hours of electricity per metric ton of thorium. The waste generated by TFR must be stored for only 300 years, as opposed to the thousands of years required for the waste generated by uranium plants.
In regard to expense, the TFR itself consists of little more than a low-pressure fluid circuit filled with a low-cost, molten fluoride salt. There is neither a massive high-pressure system nor thousands of fuel rods. There is also no need for a fallible decay heat removal system. Because the core essentially has no complex internal components, the power output of the reactor is limited only by how rapidly molten salt can be forced through the core. A single TFR, with the same size core as a conventional reactor, could produce literally tens of times as much energy. These two factors, simplicity of construction and an increased energy output, even suggest that TFR would be cheaper than coal-powered electricity.
If the goal of nuclear energy is to construct a failsafe, inexpensive facility, then energy policy analysts need look no further: The Thorium Fluoride Reactor is ready for business.
Joseph Archer is a professional engineer with a degree in nuclear engineering.
These are also referred to as LFTR (Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor), in case you want more information.
4 out of 5 dentists recommend it.
Bump!
I’ve read quite a bit of positive info on thorium salt reactors. They’ve been around for decades. There has to be some serious drawbacks. I’ve read none (major). Nuclear energy is worldwide, someone should have had to taken that route by now. Strange. I feel I’m missing something regarding the drawbacks of an operational system.
If this works as described, why hasn’t someone put one online and sold the generated power?
Generating 300x the amount of today’s reactor would yield big money
We have been FOOLISH not to pursue this technology!
Ping to you.
If you design a better mousetrap, the government won't let you build it? (threatens their status quo buddies, their cash cows)
OK. That’s the good news. What’s the down side?
Two big drawbacks - engineering for molten-metal-coolant reactors of any kind is a b*tch, and (IIRC) there is no reprocessing.
Neither one is insurmountable, but the other thing is that without the uranium cycle reactors, you cannot make nuclear weapons.
The comparison of gigawatt hours per metric ton is versus natural uranium, which is 0.7% U235, the fissile isotope. The U238 can be cooked to form Pu239, however, that is also bomb material.
This reactor turns Th232 into U233, another fissile isotope of uranium. There would still need to be some U235 fission involved to get things going, unless the initial fuel load has U233 in there.
Unlike what the article says, control rods are needed.
There would also need to be an auxiliary heating plant for startup and for outages to keep the salt liquid. With a 600 degree melting point, using superheated steam (pipes, jacketing) might be feasible - however you do not want the steam to come in contact with the salt.
Here’s a good article on Thorium andy why we didn’t pursue it.
http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/science//stories/2010/03/07/thorium-art-gc67nvgb-1.html?sid=101
Is there any of these built as a real world test?
Because you can’t have a weapons program using Thorium. A dirty little secret about Uranium fueled reactors and their duality of purpose.
Very simply, because it was decided to work the Uranium-plutonium cycle as you got both power and weapons-grade fissionables out of it. The Thorium cycle is not conducive to making nuclear weapons. .
Assuming we still have a large supply of weapons grade uranium (big assumption these days) there should be no reason not to put a few of these online now
1. Thorium is far more abundant than fuel-grade uranium.
2. The fuel for a LFTR doesn't need to be made into pellet form and then formed into fuel rods at considerable expense.
3. You can use plutonium from dismantled nuclear weapons and even spent uranium fuel rods as fuel for a LFTR.
4. LFTR's by its design are essentially meltdown-proof.
5. The radioactive waste from an LFTR is a tiny fraction of the waste from a uranium reactor--and the radioactive half-life is only a few hundred years. That means the waste could be dumped safely into a disused salt mine or salt dome for permanent disposal at very low cost.
So what are we waiting for?
I have been looking into this every since the Japan Disaster.
Here is a real good source of info on it and there are always updates:
http://www.facebook.com/EnergyFromThorium
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