This and other news related to the same topic already posted In the thread of LENR vs renewable and ERNC.
I think we are 70 years late with this. I have known about the LFTR since 2009, this is a technology that was validated in the 1960s and the fact we don’t use it since is only explained by the control of the military industrial complex over all governments.
What do you think about this?
The problem is that the novel technology may be eventually good.. idealistically/ theoretically etc
as long as you have a diverse team of competent scientists/engineers
and decades for trial and error.
Political shortcuts and lack of consultation/diversity lead to failure/disaster..
To a certain extent this happens in the West..but it is worse in
Soviet style , politburo type science.
and the current Chinese party bureaucracy
has little idea of hazard reduction or effective problem solving
also the idea of
"
Silicon Valley's “fail faster, fail often, fail better” is anathema to rigid politicised structures.
The XJP bureaucracy is rapidly rigidifying.
I am thinking of starting my own backyard thorium reactor
with a a small stumble for myself but a Great Leap Forward for humanity.
To quote Mao's Little Red Book
"
"Though death befalls all men alike, it may be
weightier than Mount Tai thorium or lighter than a feather."
https://www.marxists.org/ebooks/mao/Quotations_from_Chairman_Mao_Tse-tung.pdf
(2015)
“The Essential CANDU
3.6 Thorium Cycle
232Th is fertile and can be used to produce 233U, which is fissile and is used in situ as it is pro- duced. In the CANDU reactor, a once-through thorium cycle is economically viable, which enables energy to be derived from 233U without reprocessing and recycling. Full benefit from the thorium cycle would require reprocessing of the used fuel to recover and recycle the 233U at an appropriate concentration as new reactor fuel.
Thorium cycles are important because thorium is much more abundant on Earth than ura- nium. Some countries or regions have thorium resources, but lack plentiful uranium. They can extend the energy from natural uranium (which is the source of the only natural fissile material) by using the thorium cycle. In addition, thorium cycles provide other benefits, such as in fuel performance and fuel safety, as explained in a later section devoted specifically to thorium.”
https://www.unene.ca/essentialcandu/pdf/18%20-%20Fuel%20Cycles.pdf
(56 page PDF)
9.3.1 Energy from thorium
The paragraphs below are based largely on and/or reproduced from Boczar et al. [2012], IAEA [2005], and WNA [2014].
As illustrated in Section 2.2 , 232Th must first be converted into 233U for use in power genera- tion. “Therefore, thorium fuel concepts require that 232Th be first irradiated in a reactor be- fore fissile material can be made available. The 233U that is produced can either be chemically separated from the parent thorium fuel and recycled into new fuel, or the 233U may be us- able in-situ in the same fuel form”.
“Thorium fuels therefore need a fissile material as a ‘driver’ so that a chain reaction can be initiated and maintained. The only fissile driver options are 233U, 235U, or 239Pu, none of which is easy to supply”.…
What do you think about this?
?
Molten salt technology is safer (seems like), but a Th reactor is still a U reactor.
Canada and China have been working together on Th reactors for many years.
Thorium reactor no needs pressurized water for cooling , so in this way the field would never have had counter publicity from Tchernobyl or Fukushima.
Molten salt technology is safer (seems like), but a Th reactor is still a U reactor.
Canada and China have been working together on Th reactors for many years.
And a pilot reactor run perfectly in Oak Ridge in the 1960s. It worked for 4 years and proved the concept viable. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wik…n-Salt_Reactor_Experiment
It worked for 4 years and proved the concept viable
The cleanup at OakRidge took a long time ...supposed to done by 2009..
But appears still not to be complete..2021
Soviet Russia still has cleanup issues at a large number of sites..
not just military
but they are now no longer a Soviet.,, its someone else's problem
I imagine that the environmental concern is not a high priority at the China site.
There is no 'green' lobby.. just as there wasn't under the Soviets
its not difficult to get permission to build nuclear like it is in the West.
LENR... LENR LENR ? Maybe I will write to Zhang about a deuterium-samarium reactor..
Display MoreThe cleanup at OakRidge took a long time ...supposed to done by 2009..
But appears still not to be complete..2021
https://www.emcbc.doe.gov/SEB/orrcc/Document%20Library.php
Soviet Russia still has cleanup issues at a large number of sites..
not just military
but they are now no longer a Soviet.,, its someone else's problem
I imagine that the environmental concern is not a high priority at the China site.
There is no 'green' lobby.. just as there wasn't under the Soviets
its not difficult to get permission to build nuclear like it is in the West.
LENR... LENR LENR ? Maybe I will write to Zhang about a deuterium-samarium reactor..
I have never said this is an alternative that doesn’t come with problems, but the problems of LFTR are far less complex to solve than the problems of the enriched uranium classic approach.
